Monday, January 02, 2023

Joe Biden's claim re: Iraq, QS was a thug, and more

December 30th, THE TAMPA BAY TIMES ran this from POLITIFACT:

President Joe Biden mentioned his travels through war zones and the Middle East during a summit about veterans health care at the Delaware National Guard headquarters.

The facility is named for Biden’s late son Beau, who served in Iraq with the Guard.

“I’ve been in and out — not as a, obviously, combatant — but in and out of Afghanistan, Iraq and those areas, 38, 39 times,” he said Dec. 16. “Not as president; only twice as president.”

Biden’s description of his travels to the two countries has not held up under scrutiny.


And today, someone e-mails it to the public account and writes, "You emphasis on gay America means you have missed stories like this.  You really need to rethink your focus.  The President of the United States lies that he visited Iraq as president and you don't even notice."


Thanks for the note but, no, I don't need it.


First off, my focus would be what I want to write about or what I feel I need to write about.  No one's paying a fee for this.  No one's employing me.  


Second off, why don't you try reading?  Especially reading before you decide to write.  You're upset on January 2nd, that POLITIFACT had a December 30th piece about Joe Biden's December 16th speech.  Okay.  And your anger over what they report has you lash out at me for my alleged silence.


Let's drop back to the day after the speech, December 17th, and what I wrote here:

Did Joe Biden lie, US names a warship after a massacre, and artifacts returned to Iraq

Friday, US President Joe Biden spoke in New Castle, Delaware at a Veterans Summit and PACT Act Town Hall.  He was speaking at The Beau Biden National Guard Reserve Center -- a place he and Jill Biden last visited January 19, 2021 when  "Jill and I stopped to say goodbye to Delaware as we were about to be sworn in in Washington, D.C. to take our Oath of Office." 


NATION.LK and FOX NEWS are convinced that he lied about how many times he has visited Iraq and Afghanistan.  FOX notes that, back in March, POLITIFACT found he had not been to the two "over 40 times" as he'd claimed them but  21 times.  Clearly, he hasn't been to either since March so 21 is still the number.

The two outlets cite this quote from Friday, "I've been in and out, not as, obviously, a combatant, but in and out of Afghanistan, Iraq, and those areas 38, 39 times as vice president, only twice as president."

So did he lie about the total number of visits?

I don't know and they don't either.  He said "Afghanistan, Iraq and those areas."  Those areas.  What is he claiming there?  Is he including Israel?  I have no idea and neither do they which countries Joe was referring to by "those areas."  And "those areas" would have to be the "twice as president."  He hasn't been to Iraq once since being elected president.  And he didn't even meet with Iraq's previous prime minister when the p.m. visited the US this fall to speak to the UN.


THE DAILY MAIL also gloms on the remarks about visiting Iraq and Afghanistan  without appearing to notice that "those areas" are in Friday's remarks.  THE MAIL's on stronger ground calling out this part of the speech:

[. . .]

What those concerned about the truth -- at least with regards to Joe -- appear to have missed from his speech is this section:

One of the last times I flew into Iraq, I went up in the cockpit.  And they fly me with what’s called a “Silver Bullet” when you fly the President, and there’s a special container in the plane they stick you in. 

     And I went up with a — I went up with a group, and I was telling this to Beau’s father-in-law and my grade-school friend who’s sitting right there — and he’s taping it all because he’s going to use it against me here — (laughter) — Ronnie Olivere. 


How is anyone supposed to interpret that?  I think it can honestly be understood to be Joe saying that he visited Iraq as President and was in "what's called a 'Silver Bullet'" -- but the thing is, he's never visited Iraq once as President.  The last time he visited Iraq was 2016.  He wasn't president at that time.

So if you're concerned about a lie, there's one right there.


December 17th, I wrote about the speech, I repeatedly noted that he didn't visit Iraq as president.  No one that was covering it then went out on that limb.  Why?  They were scrambling to cover it and they weren't sure if he had visited Iraq or not?  It's not an issue, what goes on in Iraq, to those who cover the White House.  I didn't have to research it because he had not visited.  I didn't have to wait until, say, December 30th to call him out for that claim.

Again, it was covered.  So you didn't do the reading required before making an allegation.  


And that might be because you're closed minded and homophobic.


We have many things we focus on here.  Music.  Veterans issues.  Freeing Julian Assange.  Iraq.  And other issues.  For you, any focus on gay issues is clearly a trigger.  You should probably ask yourself why that is.


Parades will take place this month in Iraq for the illegally murdered thug Qassem Soleimani.


See, you can tell the truth about what he was and still tell the truth about his illegal murder by the US government. 


And his murder doesn't make him, in retrospect, a better person.



The fight against ISIS by the militias was not about ISIS.  It was about Sunnis.  It was part of the never-ending war on Sunnis.  QS terrorized Sunnis long before ISIS showed up in Iraq.  In fact, along with Nouri al-Maliki, QS is responsible for the rise in ISIS.


They are a terrorist organization.  They had demands and that was the attacks on Sunnis stop, the illegal kidnapping and imprisonment of the Sunni population stop.  There were not outrageous requests.  The people were making these requests before ISIS came along.  They went through the ballot box (the US government overturned the results of that election with The Erbil Agreement), they went through their elected representatives (Joe Biden got Jalal Talabani to toss aside the petition to remove Nouri al-Maliki) and then turned to protests in the street.  After all three failed to end the persecution, ISIS emerged.  


No one should have been surprised.  And for two years before ISIS rose, we warned about it here.  That is what happens when people are persecuted and all their legitimate avenues of change are blocked.


We're not all idiots on the left but we do have our simple-minded.  The simple-minded are the ones who sprung up to glorify QS after his murder.  It's always binary for them, either/or.  If the US government is against something (in this case if Donald Trump is against something) or someone, then the simple-minded rush to glorify that something or someone.


QS is a murderer.  He has a ton of blood on his hands.  That's reason to arrest him.  I don't feel that's reason to drone him.  He was an evil man.  The simple-minded continue to lie about him.


What you should notice about their lies?


Maybe I'm wrong.  Maybe they're right.  Could be.  But it's not and here's your reality on that: the Margaret Kimberleys and the CodeStinkers never said a word about the protests, about The October Revolution.  Those protests lasted from October 2019 well into COVID.  But the simple-minded couldn't note this because they don't pay attention to Iraq and they don't really care about the Iraqi people.


But let an Iranian killer be killed and suddenly they're up in arms.


They're fake asses.  They had a chance to stand with the young people of Iraq and month after month, they ignored them.  To this day they have dishonored them.


And this is how stupid the simple-minded are.  When I first started noting that, I got e-mails telling me I was an apologist for the Sunni population.  That puzzled me.  Then more e-mails poured in saying that I only defended The October Revolution because they were Sunnis.


Ooooohhh.


Now I get it.  I'm dealing with imbeciles.


No, you stupid fool, The October Revolution was the Shia youth.  The Sunnis stop protesting long ago, they don't feel a part of Iraq because of the ongoing persecution.


Anyway, let's wind down with this obvious Tweet.








Exactly.


2022 year-in-review pieces:

Isaiah's "2023 arrives, 2022 be gone," Isaiah's THE WORLD TODAY JUST NUTS "THE PEW loses it," "2022: The Year of WTF," Kat's "2022 in music," Ruth's "Ruth's Report: Networks and Streaming," Martha and Shirley's "2022 in Books (Martha & Shirley)," Stan's "2022 in film (Ann and Stan)" and Ann's "2022 in film (Ann and Stan)" Trina's "Labor story of 2022," Mike's "Idiot of 2022," Marcia's "The Most Disgusting Person of 2022" and Elaine's "What album am I looking forward to most in 2023?." 

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