Friday, October 4, 2013. Chaos and violence continue, the election law is still not passed, the white wash of the birth defects in Iraq is called out, American professor Noam Chomsky offers some truth about Iraq, US House Rep Tim Ryan drives his BMW to Congress (Bitch, Moan and Whine), a new rumor about Iraqi Christians (which comes from an Iraqi Christian), and more.
Yesterday, things really got shrill on the floor of Congress as US House Rep Tim Ryan screeched:
I was against the Iraq War! The Iraq War was unaffordable! The Iraq War was unpopular! 58% of the American people were against the Iraq War! Democrats didn't shut down the government! Use the political process! Which we did and won the House back in '06 and won the presidency in '08 and we wound down the Iraqi War!
KPFA played Little Coward Tim Ryan shrieking over and over yesterday and today.
Tim Ryan is offended that some against ObamaCare are willing to stand up for their beliefs.
If Little Coward Tim Ryan isn't a liar, he's just a little coward who can't take a stand, he's confessed to how worthless and useless he is:
I was against the Iraq War! The Iraq War was unaffordable! The Iraq War was unpopular! 58% of the American people were against the Iraq War! Democrats didn't shut down the government!
Unaffordable?
Try criminal. It was criminal.
And notice how he can't speak of the human costs of that war. His own guilt shames him into silence on that. He has blood on his hands and wants to attack Republicans for doing now what he was too damn cowardly to do?
As the American people are seeing right now, with ObamaCare, what you could have done to stop the Iraq War but refused to do. Because Tim Ryan was a coward.
How many people died -- and continue to die -- because of the cowardly, worthless Tim Ryan?
He threw a shrill tantrum on the floor of Congress yesterday that basically confesses to his own worthlessness and cowardice. If he had the same convictions the ObamaCare opponents do, the Iraq War could have cost a lot less lives. (Maybe even been averted. He started serving in Congress in January 2013.)
Tim Ryan: Democrats didn't shut down the government! Use the political process! Which we did and won the House back in '06 and won the presidency in '08 and we wound down the Iraqi War!
No, they didn't shut down the government. Nor did they end the illegal war as they promised they would if they got even one house of Congress in the 2006 mid-terms. They did nothing. They threatened. They got the White House benchmarks -- and then refused to use them. (US House Rep Lloyd Doggett was the only one in 2008 raising those benchmarks in hearings.) They betrayed the people of America. And, as Tim Ryan's shrill act should have gotten across, they could have stopped it in 2007 or 2008. But they chose not to.
Tim Ryan's proud moment is really just another example of the spineless and cowardly behavior Congressional Democrats displayed throughout the Bully Boy Bush years. In the Barack years? They can't show strength now either. They can only whine and bitch.
Today Noam Chomsky Tweets:
The Tweet comes on the same day
The Lancet publishes Paul C. Webster's article questioning the ridiculous report the World Health Organization and and the Iraqi Ministry of Interior 'published' (released in nonsense form) last month on the birth defects in Iraq. Excerpt:
Researchers in Iraq, the UK, and the USA who
have probed congenital birth defects and have published recent
peer-reviewed studies also express concerns about the methodology
employed by the Iraqi MOH and WHO.
Although
WHO says that “at this point no effort to neither substantiate nor
negate the findings of other studies can be employed because the study
is not aiming to establish cause-effect associations between [congenital
birth defects] prevalence and environmental risk factors”, the study
issued by the Iraqi Government states that “in recent years there have
been several anecdotal reports of geographical regions with an unusually
high prevalence of congenital birth defects in Iraq. Most of the
reports did not meet the norms for an objective study of birth defects,
and a review of the published literature could find no clear evidence to
support their findings.”
Samira Alaani, a paediatrician in Fallujah, Iraq, who copublished a 2011 study
utilising hospital records to conclude that congenital malformations
accounted for 15% of all births in Fallujah since 2003, says the new
study cofunded by WHO and the Iraqi Government should have employed
hospital records more comprehensively.
Muhsin Al-Sabbak of the Basrah Medical School in Basrah, Iraq, who copublished a 2012 study
reporting a 17-fold increase in birth defects in the Al Basrah
Maternity Hospital since 1994, warns that the data from Basrah in the
new study does not match local hospital records.
Alison Alborz is a specialist on learning disabilities in children at the University of Manchester, UK, who published a 2013 study
presenting data from a 2010 survey of 6032 households in four Iraqi
governates including data for more than 10 000 children and young people
showing a prevalence of congenital birth defects more than 2·5 times
higher than reported in the Iraqi Government study. She says the new
report gives little information about sampling and does not offer any
discussion of whether the districts chosen for analysis “reflect the
characteristics of the governorate as a whole”.
The War Criminals are trying to cover their crimes. The US government put heavy pressure on WHO over this report. Bully Boy Bush isn't in the White House anymore. Meaning, the War Crimes continue. And, in the US, you have to pin the continuation on someone other than Bully Boy Bush. Can you do the math on your own? Every day children are born in areas of Iraq with birth defects that are
a direct result of the illegal war, covering up a report, hiding it,
delaying it, will not change that fact. As
Michel Chossudovsky (Global Research) noted last month, "Furthermore, recent revelations by Hans von Sponeck, the former
Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations, suggest that WHO may
be susceptible to pressure from its member states. Mr. von Sponeck said
that 'The US government sought to prevent WHO from surveying areas in
southern Iraq where DU had been used and caused serious health and
environmental dangers'."
People covering for a War Lord in the White House currently are not people who are helping the children of Iraq.
As the Scientific Secretary of the European Committee on Radiation Risk Christopher Busby (RT) pointed out last week, "Since the outcome is intended to exonerate the
US and UK military from what are effectively war crimes, and
since the result will be employed to defend the continued use of
uranium weapons, all concerned in this chicanery should be put
before a criminal court and tried for what they have done.
Their actions are responsible for human suffering and death
and cannot be forgiven. This is a human rights issue." The
Center for Constitutional Rights'
Jeena Shah notes at Huffington Post:
This week, one of the world's most renowned and respected medical journals, The Lancet, joined the chorus of epidemiologists challenging the credibility of
a recently-released report by the World Health Organization (WHO) and
the Iraqi Health Ministry. The report contradicts consistent reporting
of high rates of birth defects in Iraq following the U.S. invasion in
2003. The WHO's defense of the study despite the critiques from many
corners raises questions as to the independence of the international
body tasked with monitoring and addressing public health crises around
the globe.
Doctors across Iraq report that cancer rates, birth defects, and
other environmental health problems have skyrocketed since 2003. In the
words of Dr. Mozhgan Savabieasfahani, an environmental toxicologist
based in Michigan who has been studying the rise in congenital birth
defects in Iraq since the 2003 U.S. invasion, "Iraq is poisoned."
Among the toxic munitions used by the U.S. military, depleted uranium, also known as "DU," is known
to lead to cancer and genetic defects from exposure to its radiation
and carcinogenic chemical properties. Scientific studies also strongly suggest that DU can interfere with the pre-natal development of a fetus.
Please note that US President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry have recently developed an interest in chemical weapons.
As the Iraq Solidarity Association in Stockholm has pointed out:
Weapons with depleted uranium were previously used during the first
Gulf War in 1991. The city of Basra suffered harshly. In 2004 the US
carried out two big attacks against the city of Fallujah. Uranium
weapons as well as white phosphorus were used against the civilian
population. Many deformed children have been born in Fallujah at the
General Hospital since then. In Fallujah, Basra, Najaf, Bagdad, Hawija
and other cities children suffer from deformities, cancer and other
illnesses.
We have previously encouraged the Swedish government to both
nationally and internationally support independent, international
investigations about the children and the causes of their serious
genetic disorders and the increasing frequency of illnesses. You now
have an excellent opportunity to encourage President Obama to reveal the
systems and quantities of weapons the US used in Fallujah. This would
be of enormous assistance to the research.
President Obama´s Secretary of State John Kerry has said that the US
condemns the use of chemical weapons. In order for this statement to be
able to be taken seriously President Obama must account in detail for
the US use of chemical weapons and demand legal responsibility for the
crimes committed. Instead President Obama´s Justice Department has
demanded immunity for his predecessor George W Bush and five of his
close conspirators for war crimes. No responsible person on a high level
in the US administration may be charged with war crimes!
Iraq War veteran Ross Caputi was in Falluja during the second US assault (November 2004).
In a 2011 column at the Guardian, he noted:
I do not see any contradiction in feeling sympathy for the
dead US Marines and soldiers and at the same time feeling sympathy for
the Fallujans who fell to their guns. The contradiction lies in
believing that we were liberators, when in fact we oppressed the
freedoms and wishes of Fallujans. The contradiction lies in believing
that we were heroes, when the definition of "hero" bares no relation to
our actions in Fallujah.
What we did to Fallujah cannot be undone,
and I see no point in attacking the people in my former unit. What I
want to attack are the lies and false beliefs. I want to destroy the
prejudices that prevented us from putting ourselves in the other's shoes
and asking ourselves what we would have done if a foreign army invaded
our country and laid siege to our city.
I understand the
psychology that causes the aggressors to blame their victims. I
understand the justifications and defence mechanisms. I understand the
emotional urge to want to hate the people who killed someone dear to
you. But to describe the psychology that preserves such false beliefs is
not to ignore the objective moral truth that no attacker can ever
justly blame their victims for defending themselves.
The same distorted morality has been used to justify attacks against the native Americans, the Vietnamese, El Salvadorans, and the Afghans.
It is the same story over and over again. These people have been
dehumanised, their God-given right to self-defence has been
delegitimised, their resistance has been reframed as terrorism, and US
soldiers have been sent to kill them.
History has preserved these
lies, normalised them, and socialised them into our culture: so much so
that legitimate resistance against US aggression is incomprehensible to
most, and to even raise this question is seen as un-American.
He has made a documentary entitled
Fear Not the Path of Truth.
His organization, The Justice For Fallujah Project, notes:
Events
November 18th
Premier screening of Fear Not the Path of Truth
At the Paulist Center
5 Park St. Boston, MA
6:00 PM to 9:00 PM
The screening will be followed by a reception with free food and drinks (no alcohol allowed).
November 19th
Screening of Fear Not the Path of Truth
At the Old Oak Dojo
14 Chestnut Place, Boston MA
In June,
Alsumaria reported that congenital malformations and rates of cancer are extremely
high as a result of the uranium munitions the US military used. It's no
longer unusual for a child to be born with two heads or with just one
eye, the report explains, and the health statistics are much worse than
in Japan in the aftermath of the US using the atomic bombs. In Falluja,
children born with deformities account for 14.7% of all births. The
report notes that although Iraq has a population estimated at 31
million, there are only 20,000 medical doctors and just over 100
psychotherapists in the country.
Dr. Mozhgan Savabiesfahani also penned a column for Al Jazeera last March:
Our study in two Iraqi cities, Fallujah and Basrah, focused on
congenital birth defects. In both cities, the study revealed increasing
numbers of congenital birth defects, especially neural tube defects and
congenital heart defects. It also revealed public contamination with two
major neurotoxic metals, lead and mercury. The Iraq birth defects
epidemic is, however, surfacing in the context of many more public
health problems in bombarded cities. Childhood leukemia, and other types
of cancers are increasing in Iraq. Childhood leukemia rates in Basra more than doubled between 1993 and 2007. In 1993, the annual rate of childhood leukemia was 2.6 per 100,000 individuals and by 2006 it had reached 12.2 per 100,000.
Multiple cancers in patients (patients with simultaneous tumors on
both kidneys and in the stomach, for example), an extremely rare
occurrence, have also been reported. Dr Jawad al-Ali, a cancer
specialist at the Sadr Teaching Hospital in Basra, discussed the issue of multiple cancers with Der Spiegel
last December. Familial cancer clusters, described as the occurrence of
multiple cancers throughout an entire family, were also disclosed in
that Spiegel report.
These observations collectively suggest an extraordinary public
health emergency in Iraq. Such a crisis requires urgent multifaceted
international action to prevent further damage to public health.
She's right, this is a crisis. It needs to addressed immediately -- not denied, not covered up. Cleaned up? Yeah, as much as it can be, the toxic areas need to be cleaned up and the US government is the one who should be footing the costs. Former United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator
Denis Halliday (Global Research) observes, "This tragedy in Iraq reminds one of US Chemical Weapons used in
Vietnam. And that the US has failed to acknowledge or pay compensation
or provide medical assistance to thousands of deformed children born and
still being born due to American military use of Agent Orange
throughout the country. The millions of gallons of this chemical dumped
on rural Vietnam were eagerly manufactured and sold to the Pentagon by
companies Dupont, Monsanto and others greedy for huge profits.’
"The US Has Left Iraq With An Epidemic Of Cancers and Birth Defects." That's the number 12 censored story in
Project Censored's Top 25 Censored Stories From 2012 - 2013 which is released (in print and digital formats) this coming Tuesday. (
Mickey Huff and Peter Phillipsdiscussed the book today on The Morning Mix on KPFA -- each Friday Project Censored hosts The Morning Mix -- eight am to nine am PST).
Censor is what Nouri al-Maliki tries to do to the Iraq media.
Ali Musa (Al Mada) reports that Nouri's forces shut down the local radio in Balad -- the last station -- accusing it of being a mouthpiece for the poor. (Yes, the police really said that and, yes, they seem to think there can be no greater horror than giving a voice to the poor.) For this 'crime,' the radio station was surrounded after the sun went down by the police who quickly took over the station and shut it down. This is the country, Ali Musa reminds, where over 360 journalists have been killed since 2003.
The Journalistic Freedoms Observatory, an Iraqi journalist organization, noted in this year's report that 2012 was the worst year for Iraqi journalists since Saddam Hussein was overthrown (by foreign invaders).
Protests took place today.
Iraqi Spring MC notes protests took place in Baghdad, in
Tikrit,
Najaf,
Ramadi, Falluja,
Samarra,
Baquba,
Balad Ruz,
Jalawla, among other sites.
Protests have been taking place non-stop since
December 21st. Of today's protests,
NINA notes:
Preachers of Friday-prayers called on the sit-inner in their sermons to
continue the sit-ins as are the only way to get rid of injustice and
abuse policy.
They said in the common prayer which held in six
regions of Diyala province : " Iraqi government must not deal with the
demands of the protestors in a double standard . Urging worshipers to
unify their stand until getting the demands, release innocent prisoners
and detainees from prisons.
Kitabat reports
that Sheikh Mohammed al-Dulaimi spoke at the Falluja protest and
accused the government of supporting militias who target and kill
Sunnis. The Sheikh said that instead of implementing the demands of the
protesters, the government would rather target or ignore the
protesters.
National Iraqi News offers the Sheikh said, ""The Iraqi government rather than implement the demands of the
protesters and adopt genuine reconciliation with people, it tracking and
embarrassing the protest leaders, since 9 Months ago claimants the
usurped legal rights."
Sheikh Mohammed al-Dulaimi is correct in his accusation: Nouri
al-Maliki (prime minister and chief thug of Iraq) is supporting Shi'ite
militias.
Tim Arango (New York Times) broke that story last week
-- but somehow the US Congress and the rest of the media missed it.
(The media may be playing dumb. Members of Congress actually missed it,
I spoke with several yesterday about Tim Arango's report.) Arango
noted:
In supporting Asaib al-Haq, Mr. Maliki has apparently made the risky
calculation that by backing some Shiite militias, even in secret, he can
maintain control over the country’s restive Shiite population and,
ultimately, retain power after the next national elections, which are
scheduled for next year. Militiamen and residents of Shiite areas say
members of Asaib al-Haq are given government badges and weapons and
allowed freedom of movement by the security forces.
And the protesters were targeted today.
NINA notes both the Falluja and the Ramadi sit-ins were targeted with sound bombs.
That wasn't the only violence.
NINA notes a
Tikrit bombing claimed 2 lives and left seven people injured, a
Falluja sticky bombing killed 1 person and left another injured, an
Anbar Province bombing ("on the road between Hadeetha and Rutba") claimed the life of 1 Iraqi soldier and left two more injured, and "
One
officer and one soldier killed and six police and military men wounded
in a suicide attack on Friday, Oct. 4, in a suicide attack against joint
military and police checkpoint at the entrance of Heet district,
western Anbar province."
The Associated Press reports
the targeting of a Sunni mosque in Umm al-Adham with a bombing ("hidden
inside an air conditioner) which has left at least 33 people dead and
at least forty-five injured.
The Iraq Times reports that Iraqi National Congress leader Ahmed Chalabi declared Nouri al-Maliki must be stopped from wasting the Iraqi people's money. Chalabi is complaining that Nouri has earmarked $15 million for Somolia. Chalabi demands to know what gave Nouri the right to give these funds? Chalabi points out that, in Iraq, many families currently go without food and poverty is widespread. What does it mean? Every four years, Chalabi offers criticism of Nouri. Campaign season is beginning in Iraq.
Musrafa al-Kadhimi (Al-Monitor) reports today:
Iraqi politicians are obviously unwilling
and probably incapable of offering any consensual solutions to the
exacerbating Iraqi crisis before the Iraqi parliamentary elections likely to be held in the middle of next year.
The main reason for this conviction is that the various parties are
still hoping the elections will solve the crisis. This is not based on a
firm conviction that elections are a democratic means for changing
power, but rather on the hope that elections will change the current
political map in favor of one party or another, allowing it to impose
its vision of the solution.
The truth is, while elections represent a suitable track for venting
political tensions, they are not sufficient as an end goal to a crisis,
such as the one currently faced by Iraq. This is a country that remains
unable to overcome its transitional phase, and is embroiled in conflicts
over the foundations of its political processes and the dispute over
the method of the state administration, in addition to major security
collapses.
For an election to be held, the Parliament must pass a law.
NINA reports:
Rapporter of the parliament MP, for IS coalition , Muhammad Al-Khalidi
said " adjorning of today's parliament session to next Monday represent
the last chance to vote on the election law.
Khalidi pointed out
at a press conference today that "differences on the paragraphs of the
election law are still ongoing between the political blocs," adding that
"the Presidency of the House of Representatives has given the political
blocs the final chance to reach an agree on the electoral law on next
Monday.
al-Khalidi is with Iraqiya (IS stands for "Iraqiya Slate).
Thursday at the State Dept press briefing, spokesperson Marie Harf was asked about the visa program for Iraqis who helped the US military.
QUESTION: The other question is related to the mention that the Congress approved the program --
MS. HARF: Mm-hmm.
QUESTION: -- or the funding of the program for the Iraqi visas or those Iraqis who work for U.S.
MS. HARF: Mm-hmm.
QUESTION: In the same time, I mean, the other budget
allocation is not done for the other activities. I mean, how you can
explain that? I mean, it’s like you can spend money for that program but
you cannot spend other money for some essential activities?
MS. HARF: Well, to be clear, they voted yesterday to extend
the program. I’m not sure about where the funding for it exactly lies,
what bucket of money that comes out of. We thought it was an important
step that they did come together to vote to extend it. But clearly, we
believe that all of our programs are important, and we believe that we
shouldn’t have to make difficult choices between competing priorities
that are very important to our foreign policy. So I was giving, as an
example, of a way Congress has been able to work together on an
important priority for us.
Al Bawaba adds:
When the five year old visa plan ended on September 30, it threatened
to halt the visa processing for thousands of Iraqis who had helped the
American military during the near decade long war. The 2,500 odd interpreters whose visas are awaiting approval are often at risk from extremists who consider them traitors for having helped American forces.
“These
are the interpreters, the guides, drivers, people who performed a
myriad of functions that were essential for American operations,” said
Representative Earl Blumenauer, an Oregon Democrat who introduced the
first legislation on the program six years ago. “Last night, the United
States sent a signal that we are not going to leave them behind.”
The program gets re-instated as Iraq's own visas are called out.
Alsumaria reports:
Iraq
ranked second in the world’s worst passports list due to the problems
its carriers face to acquire visas, according to Henley & Partners’
Visa Restrictions Index 2013.
Afghanistan came first, followed by Iraq, Somalia, Pakistan, Occupied Palestine, Eretria, Sudan, Sri Lanka and Lebanon.
However, one Iraqi politician feels that visas are being given out too easily -- to one segment of the population -- by the US.
Alsumaria reports:
Member
of Parliament Imad Youkhana, affiliated with Al Rafidayn Bloc, accused
the American Embassy in Iraq of working on making all the Christians
leave Iraq, urging it to cease giving them visas. He also urged the
Iraqi Government to intervene quickly and solve this problem.
“The American Embassy in Baghdad and Arbil are working on making all the
Iraqi Christians leave by offering them facilitation and visas to the
United States under different pretenses”, said Youkhana in a press
release of which Alsumaria got a copy. He warned against the dangers of
allowing Christian Iraqi families to travel away, namely voiding Iraq of
one of its most important component. This is a negative and
inacceptable phenomenon.
“Giving visa to entire families is considered a masked ethnic cleansing
that uses the pretext of protecting minorities from terrorism”, he
revealed, pointing out that “this aims to hide their political failure
in Iraqi after they couldn’t take the moral blame of the instability in
Iraq post-occupation”.
These charges, true or false, are coming from a Christian MP.
Qassim Abdul-Zahra (AP) identified him as such last year (last paragraph of article).
Joan Wile, the author of
Grandmothers Against the War: Getting Off Our Fannies and Standing Up for Peace and one of the Raging Grannies, will be among those taking part in the following action on October 7th:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CAN WE GO HOME NOW?
PROTESTERS TO ASK ON 12TH ANNIVERSARY OF AFGHANISTAN WAR
On Oct. 7, 2013, a number of NYC peace groups will mark the 12th year of our invasion of Afghanistan by rallying at Union Square to demand an end to the war, to ask the question, "Can We Go Home Now?"
Names of the 2,272 fallen U.S, military killed in Afghanistan will be read.
The U.S. invaded Afghanistan in 2001 to capture Osama bin Laden, the leader of the terrorist group Al Qaeda.
Mission accomplished!
· Osama bin Laden is dead
· There are fewer than 100 Al Qaeda operatives in Afghanistan.
The protesters believe there is nothing more to be gained by remaining in Afghanistan.
- The government we installed after overthrowing the Taliban is hopelessly corrupt;
- It is clear that some in the current Afghanistan government are in cahoots with the Taliban and are undermining NATO efforts ;
- Prolonged occupation inevitably creates anti-U.S. resentment, just as we would resent a foreign occupation force within our borders; Our attempts to "nation-build" a country we don't understand has cost U.S. thousands of casualties and tens of thousands of Afghan civilian deaths, which has only served to radicalize more of the population;
- The cost of the war is now $120 billion per year, money that should fund new priorities reflecting urgent human needs.
"We are holding this important action so that people will realize the terrible human cost of war," said Vicki McFadyen, Treasurer of Military Families Speak Out (MFSO).
DATE: Monday, Oct. 7
TIME: 4:30 - 7 p.m.
LOCATION: 60 E. 14th St., opposite Union Square
SPONSORED BY (partial list): Military Families Speak Out (Metro), War Resisters League NY, Code Pink NY, Granny Peace Brigade, Brooklyn For Peace, Grandmothers Against the War, Manhattan Peace Action, Peace Action NYS
Added. Community bloggers participating in a theme post on snacks did the following:
Rebecca's "
pudding,"
Kat's "
Fudge,"
Ruth's "
Graham crackers,"
Betty's "
Popcorn,"
Mike's "
Cold pizza,"
Isaiah's "
Heck Of A Job (Snow Cones),"
Elaine's "
Sea Salt and Vinegar,"
Trina's "
Junior Mints and nachos,"
Marcia's "
Cracker Jacks,"
Stan's "
Pickles" and
Ann's "
Marshmallows."
Iraq
alsumaria
noam chomsky
iraqi spring mc
national iraqi news agency
kitabat
the new york times
tim arrange
grandmothers for peace international
joan wile
Noam Chomsky
Concerned Veterans
