Friday, August 05, 2011

Nouri's latest assault and US-Iraqi forces kill a child

Protests swept the MidEast and that included Iraq. Nouri al-Maliki tried to distract (his 100 days), tried to suppress (beating and jailing reporters covering the protests) and his assault continues. The Great Iraqi Revolution published the following:


The Green-Zone government will start pursuing and prosecuting the Iraqi activists and protesters who are using the Facebook to share protests news through the Articles of the - Electronic Crime Act - . The preliminary reading of the NEW E-Crime Act was a few days ago and here's its articles :

Article 4 - Whoever starts or runs a website with the intent to execute programes or ideas to disobey the public order or promote , facilitate or implement such actions will be sentensed with life imprisonment and a fine of not less than 25 million Iraqi Dinars and not more than 50 Iraqi million Dinars .

Article 6 - A sentence of life imprisonment and a fine of not less than 25 million Iraqi Dinars and not more than 50 Iraqi million Dinars will be executed if any citizen uses the computers or the internet with intent to commit one of the following acts :
1- Creating chaos in order to undermine the authorities using the country's electronic systems .
2- Provoking an armed rebellion, threatening of starting it or promoting it , inciting sectarianism, disturbing security or public order or offending the country's reputation.


So the corrupt government has started a new law to use it as an excuse to pursue us and silence our voices, is this the "democracy" of the "new" Iraq ? the democracy that we lost our independence and 1.5 million Iraqi casualties for ?


Nouri consolidates his power by silencing the opposition and by ensuring he's protected by US troops. On the topic of non-withdrawal, Al Mada reports that Moqtada al-Sadr's bloc in Parliament is stating that they have not agreed to go along with or approve the plan to keep the US military in Iraq under the guise of trainers. The spokesperson calls it a betrayal of Iraqis and notes that if the issue was really training there would be no need to specify how many US soldiers would remain in Iraq. Aswat al-Iraq reports that US Ambassador to Iraq James Jeffery and Iraqi President Jalal Talabani met last night to continue discussions about keeping US forces in Iraq beyond the end of the year. Karamatullah K. Ghori (Asia Times) notes of the reasons (excuses) being given to argue for keeping US troops in Iraq:


In touting the line that Iraqi forces are inadequate to rise to challenges that remain largely undefined beyond the cryptic excuse of sectarian divide, the generals betray an appalling disregard for their own failure to train their Iraqi proteges sufficiently. If they couldn't do it in eight years, despite all the resources and numbers at their command, what's there to lend confidence to anyone that they'd be able to find the holy grail of a competent and fully trained Iraqi security force with a thinned-out and scaled-down presence?
Iraqi politicians, representing the full spectrum of the country's myriad factions and clans, do seem to a certain extent to subscribe to the American angst on account of the Iraqi troops' half-baked ability to take charge of the gargantuan task of keeping the country secured against anarchy.

As part of the deal to open discussions (and to keep US troops in Iraq -- Nouri wouldn't have given in just for 'discussions'), Nouri's agreed to finally create the security council to be headed by Ayad Allawi that the Erbil Agreement promised last November. Al Mada reports that State of Law is attempting to fast track the issue through the Parliament and stating that no additional conditions have to be met to create the council.

Last week in al-Rifeiat, a US-Iraqi mission resulted in the deaths of at least 3 Iraqis (some reports say four). The New York Times' Tim Arango has covered the events here and here. Today Aswat al-Iraq reports on a joint-raid by the US-and Iraqi forces in a the village of Kidhr in which 1 small boy and a police officer were killed by the joint-forces and the child's father was left injured.


We'll close with this from World Can't Wait's "We Are Not Your Soldiers At LA Rising" which features numerous photos if you use the link:


We Are Not Your Soldiers was an undeniable presence at LA Rising. Hundreds of orange WANYS bandanas were visible on arms, around necks, hanging from belts, and worn as head covers. 10 Students from the LA area, whose teacher has had the speaking tour visit his classes, staffed our table and met and talked with young people about driving recruiters out of schools.

Youth, and all ages created a We Are NOT Your Soldiers Banner collectively and this process evoked thoughtful discussions between people who got to know each other as they spoke about what message they wanted military recruiters to hear. "Bombing for peace is like f*&king for virginity""F&*k YOU-I won't do what you tell me!""Don't be manipulated by your own gov't again!""Wake Up!!!""I love my friends so stop recruiting!""Ya Basta!" "Don't take my brother!"




The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.


























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In a bad economy, don't piss people off

Bill Whitaker (CBS Evening News -- link has text and video) reports on veterans efforts to find jobs. It is known that young male veterans of the current wars are the hardest hit.

I don't doubt that high rate of unemployment. I do wonder about the figures now being used. Generally, the news media uses employment figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. And a friend who is a disable veteran from an earlier war brought up the issue this week wondering how many of the unemployed young veterans were disabled or challenged?

Good question. In 2010, the Bureau noted that the rate for disabled veterans was the same as for those with no disability. But that was all veterans, of all age groups.

The latest figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics are set to be released later this morning. That'll be July's data. Currently, we have June's data and there's not a break down by age. But male veterans of the current wars, of all ages, had an unemployment rate of 13.5% (up from 10.8% in June of 2010).

Though women are repeatedly ignored by the media, they had a 12.1% rate (down from 15.8% in June of last year). It's interesting that in the summer of 2010, women veterans of the current wars had the highest unemployment rate but no one called for hearings on that. It's interesting and it's telling and the true unemployment rate needs to be known and not a figure here or there. The number's been bandied about in Congress, it's always changing. And I mean within a 30 day period.

To be very clear, we champion for veterans to get what was promised them. That means the health care and any other benefits. We do not, at this site, put any class of Americans above another class. This isn't a military junta, this is supposed to be a democracy. In a democracy, all are supposed to be created equal.

What's my point?

Alexandra Alper, Matt Spetainick and Eric Walsh (Reuters) report, "President Barack Obama on Friday will propose a $120 million package of new tax credits for businesses that hire U.S. veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan at a time of stubbornly high unemployment at home." UPI adds, "The proposal, which Obama was to make at the Washington Navy Yard at 11 a.m. EDT Friday, will call for a $4,800 'Returning Heroes' tax credit to companies that hire veterans unemployed for six months or more and a $2,400 tax credit if they hire one without a job for less than six months, the adviser told the Examiner."

You might look the other way if veterans were facing huge unemployment in a time of prosperity. But the entire country is facing unemployment.

As most of grasp hearing Barack repeatedly lie about the military service of his grandfather (the White one), he's really sensitive to the fact that he didn't serve in the military. So he overcompensates and exaggerates. And that's fine in his own remarks but he can't do that with policy.

A) It's not fair. B) It's not smart.

Let's deal with the second one because we all know Barack wants to be re-elected. Young veterans of today's wars is a small sample of the overall population. That's why we're repeatedly told that most people don't even know anyone that's served in Iraq or Afghanistan. So a policy that will anger the largest pool of voters isn't a smart policy if you're trying to shore up votes.

Now the fairness issue, why is a subclass of male veterans getting this? African-American males over the age of 20 have an unemployment rate of 17.0% (seasonally adjusted, June 2011). Where is the program for that classification?

For today's veterans, the Congress has proposed post-service training programs and licensing and certification programs to give veterans the paperwork they need to market the skills they learned on the job. There's no problem with that. It should be done.

But when you're offering tax breaks to hire one group of people at a time of massive unemployment across the country, you better be able to justify it and you damn well better be sure it doesn't end up pissing off most people. When the unemployment lines across America are so massive, you're offering a tax incentive to hire one group means every other group of unemployed Americans are now at a disadvantage when it comes to finding a job.

That's reality. In a struggling economy with massive unemployment, jobs become a zero sum game and Blaine getting a job due to being a veteran means non-veteran Alex isn't getting that job
because there's no tax incentive to hire Alex.

In a prosperous time when jobs abounded, you could argue employment wasn't a zero sum game. But that's not the realities the US currently faces. But the reality is that Barack has not created jobs and that more jobs have been lost and continue to be lost. His approval ratings continue to drop because excuses aren't cutting it. And now with an increasingly angry electorate, worried about food and housing and facing the inflation that is going on (but no one wants to talk about), he's presenting a plan that will help very few people but provides every American who can't find a job with an excuse as to why?

This was a stupid move politically. Jobs are his weakest issue. Jobs are what he's failed to provide. Jobs are what Americans count on to pay the bills. It was a stupid move.

And it will portray him as further out of touch with Americans.


Training centers or any number of things he could have proposed for veterans and Americans wouldn't have been taken aback. But when you tell citizen A that they're going into a job interview opposite citizen B and that the government will provide the company a tax break for hiring citizen B, you're creating an unequal playing field and you're creating ill will. Not really good to do with an angry electorate which feels that government -- at all levels -- is no longer responsive to their needs.

This morning Wally and Cedric put up their latest joint-post:


And swiping from that, for Wednesday and Thursday these were the community posts:


"The wake up call"
"Day 2 with Cleaver"
"David Walsh breaks it down"
"The continued Great Recession"
"3 men, 2 women"
"4 men, 2 women"
"where is the outrage?"
"gene jones: fake and coward"
"While you looked for your comfort zone . . ."
"The wasteful lies"
"Through the mirror of my mind, time after time . . ."
"Too hot"
"Hillary"
"The real racism"
"Ugh"
"Message from Michael"
"FSRN earns praise"
"Iraq and the 'crisis'"
"Matthew Rothschild is worthless"
"THIS JUST IN! DIVAS NEED LOVE TOO!"
"A rough age for divas"

We'll close with this from Glen Ford's "Ruin-Nation: The Obama Catastrophe" (Black Agenda Report):

The most pitiful picture to emerge from the mega-debacle just witnessed in Congress, is that of Black Texas Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee, standing on the House floor in mid-July, asking “Why is this president being treated so disrespectfully” by Republicans, in the debt debate. As if insults to Obama’s dignity were the crisis ravaging her constituents and the rest of Black America. A report had just confirmed that 30 years of (meager) Black gains were wiped out between 2005 and 2009. One-third of Black America is without assets or has negative wealth, including half of Black single women, the people that raise the majority of Black kids, one-third of whom live in poverty. Black unemployment sits at Depression levels. But Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee was upset because of perceived disrespect to Obama, who offers nothing to Black people but the corporate crap-line, “A rising tide lifts all boats.”

The entire structure of social support for poor and working people was at issue, yet the Black congresswoman could think only of Obama: “Why is he different?” Jackson-Lee assured her audience that, “in my community, that is the question that we raise.”


To the extent that that is true, to the degree that Black America remains more concerned about how Obama is doing as he seeks another term in office, rather than how the African American people are doing under Obama’s center-right, Wall Street- and war-loving regime – Blacks are doomed to a period of suffering unprecedented in the modern age.

Presumably to protect the dignity of First Black President – her highest priority – Jackson-Lee joined the 95 House Democrats that voted for the certainty of losing trillions of dollars for tens of millions of needy citizens, rather than risk the possibility of unknown financial dislocations. The same number of Democrats said “No” to the president and his GOP interlocutors. Among the 40 full-voting, Democratic members of the Congressional Black Caucus, the split was 15 “Yes,” 24 “No” and one Non-Voting (NV).


The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.













thomas friedman is a great man






oh boy it never ends




















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Thursday, August 04, 2011

I Hate The War

Someone on the left who was called out in the last 14 days e-mailed the public account today. I'm not offended in the least by the e-mail but I'm going to respond here.

I'm not "always right" and certainly don't think I am. I am wrong more times than could ever be counted. And when I'm wrong, I have no problem admitting it because I've had tons of practice being wrong.

With regards to having "saw through" Barack Obama, I've written about this repeatedly as has Elaine. When Barack was running for the US Senate is when friends began saying that here was this anti-war candidate and we must support him, we must, we must. We attended the big money fundraiser (in Elaine's home base) and were prepared to max out with our donations.

But what happened was we got our face time with Barack and we didn't get the manual that said: Fawning over Barack is required at all times.

Elaine immediately raised the issue of the Iraq War. Barack responded that the US was now in Iraq so blah, blah, blah. Point being, he wasn't going to support withdrawal or advocate for cutting off war funds. I know that because after his blah, blah, blah, that was the question I asked. (June 7, 2008 is one example of Elaine writing about it, it's not the only example or even the first time -- it's the one that stands out to me because of the significance of June 7th for personal reasons.) We immediately left and, no, we didn't write checks. And we were clear about why we were bailing. He was a fake and he was a fraud.

All he had was a speech before the start of the war. That was it. All this time later, that's especially appalling. I've spent eight years going around the country speaking out against this war, Elaine's turned her entire practice into pro bono work for veterans. And Barack gave one little speech?

He's a fake, he's a fraud.

Now if that hadn't taken place, maybe we would have been taken in in 2008? I don't know. But if you read what I wrote then, you'll see me stating repeatedly that Barack needs to get honest. He never did.

The SOFA? I know contract law. It has been in my personal interest to know contract law, especially to know how to break a contract. I knew what the SOFA said and what it meant for that reason.

In the last nearly three years at Third, I've noted that if it weren't for The Common Ills, I might not be calling out Barack. I might just keep my mouth shut. I don't know. My best guess is that were it not for The Common Ills and the Iraq War, I probably would have voted for him -- prior to 2008, every presidential election was a Democratic vote for me -- if only out of tribal beliefs. ("My side's better than your side!") And after he was sworn in, I probably would have left the country and focused on water issues in Latin America for political activism. (Prior to the start of the Iraq War, I was surrounded with treaties and verdicts on water issues to try to understand that issue. That was the issue I wanted to bone up on and understand.) And for fun, I would've spent a lot of time in Europe.

That's why my fire isn't aimed at this voter or that celebrity. I could be among the silent very easily. But gas bags in whatever form (professional, whatever) are supposed to offer analysis and, ideally, truth. Those people (which includes the e-mailer) need to be called out.

Independent media spent the Bush era lecturing big media about accountability and owning mistakes and blah, bla, blah. Fine. I believe in all of those things. But my belief is not that Big Media has to do practice that while Panhandle Media can do whatever it wants.

There are no ethics in Panhandle Media. Can you imagine if ABC had done 2 hours of post-debate coverage (Hillary and Barack debating) and every 'expert' brought on the show had endorsed John McCain but ABC 'forgot' to inform viewers of that? That's exactly what KPFA did but all the 'experts' had endorsed Barack. Those two hours were supposed to have featured "your phone calls." One phone call in two hours, at the end of the show?

How did that happen?

It happened because Larry Bensky didn't want to address the big issue to KPFA listeners. He wouldn't let them on air. But they had KPFA blog and they managed to make it clear that they were outraged by something. And because they kept blogging about it, Larry started griping at them on air telling them that the blog -- about the debate -- was only there for them to post questions. No thoughts, no opinions, just questions.

That was your first damn clue that Barack was going to have to be carried across the finish line. (The issue KPFA listeners kept raising was Barack's use of homophobia. Larry refused to allow those opinions on air and tried to squelch them on the blog.)

I don't exist in a vacuum. I am answerable to the community. This site and my own writing has changed tremendously in all the years and that's a reflection of what the community shaped. You rarely get "in fairness" which was my trademark phrase once up a time.

I could not be writing here each day and answerable to the community and taking their input and processing it and been silent. Equally true, I could not have paid attention to the Iraq War -- the ongoing Iraq War -- and been silent.

The community forced me to speak out strongly (via demands and support) and I lacked the ability to fake it.

So these people who are paid to offer 'analysis' and yet can't speak out, can't tell the truth? I have no sympathy for them. They all, all the little whores of 'independent' media, want to pretend that they worship I.F. Stone.

If I.F. Stone had been around in 2008, who would he have suggested people vote for? Most likely, John McCain. He had similar strategy he espoused in his newsletter, about how a reactionary candidate could further radicalize the country to the left. But they didn't want to tell you that. However, they did want to tell you who to vote for.

In 2008, a station manager went on WBAI and felt he could tell listeners who they should vote for when all he was supposed to be doing was a time and weather break.

Norman Solomon, who wants you to believe that he has the ethics for Congress, refused to disclose that he was a delegate for Barack Obama when doing radio appearances. Now he gets paid for his written column that a few newspapers carry. He made sure to put a disclosure in his columns. But he kept going on the radio and pretending he was an independent analyst -- when he was a pledged delegate for Barack. And the hosts presenting him knew he was a pledged delegate. If George Will had done that, it be time to mount a letter writing campaign. But Norman got away with it. Almost. Again, KPFA listeners know how to throw their weight around. And they demanded he be identified as what he was. So in July, months after, it was finally revealed on air that Norman was a pledged delegate for Barack Obama.

What he did goes against everything he espouses. He tried to fool listeners, he tried to trick them. Now he was announcing early in the year in his written column that he was a pledged delegate. Why? Because he didn't want to lose those newspapers. He knew he would. But when it wouldn't hurt his pocket book, when the only abuse involved was his abuse of trust, he was happy to pretend.

He wants to fill Lynn Woolsey's seat in Congress.

He's never taken accountability for betraying every ethic he espoused and he wants support on his bid for Congress?

Does that honestly sound like someone who needs to be in Congress?

This is not a 'sour grapes' issue. There are many people who endorsed Barack (including some very good friends of mine) that I've never had a problem with. (A number of friends were defended here by me in 2008 for their endorsement of Barack.) But the liars and the whores?

Melissa Harris Lacewell Perry -- Melissa LieFace -- did a little radio show, Rev Jesse Jackson's. And on that show there was a pig named Amy Goodman. LieFace had already spent over six months working on Barack's campaign including going out to California in 2007. LieFace was on Jesse's show to espouse her love for Barack.

LieFace then shows up on Democracy Now! (see Ava and my "Democracy Sometimes?") and Amy presents her as an independent analyst. A professor who just happened to be in New Hampshire. (LieFace is no longer a professor at a prestigious university. While The Nation doesn't care about ethics, big universities do. And, tip, when there's a threat of organized denial of donations, nontenured professors get hurried out the door real quick when they violate ethical policies. She's at a lesser university now. A smaller pond.) She praised Barack as the second coming of MLK and she ignored Hillary but had words for others. What a lousy analyst! Hillary won New Hampshire!

But the following week LieFace was back on Democracy Now! and this time she was revealing that she had been campaigning for Barack. It came out as she snarled and threatened Gloria Steinem.

It was a wonderful performance. And many found it convincing. I believe Ava and I were the only ones to pointedly question Melissa's attack on White woman and claim that she was 'sitting here in all my Blackness.' Melissa's bi-racial or mixed. Melissa has a White parent. Considering she presented herself as the authority that Barack was Black, that's a detail she probably should have been forthcoming with. But when your whole life is Diana Ross & the Supremes "I'm Living In Shame," maybe honesty's just too hard?

It wasn't bad enough that Melissa pulled that stunt on Goody's show, she later showed up on PBS' Charlie Rose show and 'forgot' to reveal she was working for Barack's campign.

Again, she's no longer with Princeton. The trash has been taken to the curb and the container is labeled "The Nation magazine." I could continue on her astro-turf campaigns including the one against Tavis Smiley, but we'll move on due to time.

Those are the things that people need to take accountability for. We're not talking, "oops, I believed in the wrong candidate." We're talking ethical transgressions.

Do we want to talk about the War Whores? Tom Hayden, Laura Flanders, Danny Schechter. Danny made a movie on the Iraq War. Some people found it cheesy (the New York Times among them). I actually thought it was Danny's finest documentary. But he's not interested in Iraq now that Bush is out of office. Hmm. If I spent months working on a documentary, I'd assume the issue meant something to me. If I was an idiot and made myself part of the story in the documentary (why a lot of people saw it as a vanity exercise on Danny's part), I'd be damn sure to stay on the Iraq War issue so that my detractors didn't have ammo. Tom Hayden wanted you to know that Barack would end the Iraq War. When, Tom, when?

Tom and Laura wanted you to know that they would hold Barack's feet to the fire.

When, Tom and Laura, when?

All anyone expected was for people to walk it the way they talked it. That's not an unreasonable expectation. Those who didn't need to take accountability. The Iraq War did not end. A six-year-old child was among the dead today. Just today. How many more Iraqis have to be killed? And who will cry for them? Who will mourn their loss in the United States?

When those questions can be answered, we may have a functioning independent press. That should address all the issues you raised in your e-mail.

("Indpendent" refers to "alternative press," "Beggar Media," "Panhandle Media." Someone always gets confused when we use "independent" and assumes we're referring to all of the American press because we do have a First Amendment in this country. It's used here to refer Pacifica Radio, The Nation, The Progressive, etc.)



It's over, I'm done writing songs about love
There's a war going on
So I'm holding my gun with a strap and a glove
And I'm writing a song about war
And it goes
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Oh oh oh oh
-- "I Hate The War" (written by Greg Goldberg, on The Ballet's Mattachine!)

Last Thursday, ICCC's number of US troops killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war was 4477. Tonight it is [PDF format warning] still 4477.



The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.




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