Friday, August 19, 2011

Turkey continues bombing Iraq

The Iraqi Parliament is now in recess. Before going into recess yesterday, Alsumaria TV reportsa, there was "a Kurdish request to add the issue of Turkish bombarding on Irbil and Duhok provinces borders on the session’s agenda. Following this request the speaker called the committee of security and defense to study the issue and to present a report about the situation after the vacation." The Turkish military is targeting the PKK. The PKK is one of many Kurdish groups which supports and fights for a Kurdish homeland. Aaron Hess (International Socialist Review) described them in 2008, "The PKK emerged in 1984 as a major force in response to Turkey's oppression of its Kurdish population. Since the late 1970s, Turkey has waged a relentless war of attrition that has killed tens of thousands of Kurds and driven millions from their homes. The Kurds are the world's largest stateless population -- whose main population concentration straddles Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Syria -- and have been the victims of imperialist wars and manipulation since the colonial period. While Turkey has granted limited rights to the Kurds in recent years in order to accommodate the European Union, which it seeks to join, even these are now at risk." The Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq has been a concern to Turkey because they fear that if it ever moves from semi-autonomous to fully independent -- such as if Iraq was to break up into three regions -- then that would encourage the Kurdish population in Turkey. For that reason, Turkey is overly interested in all things Iraq. So much so that they signed an agreement with the US government in 2007 to share intelligence which the Turkish military has been using when launching bomb raids. However, this has not prevented the loss of civilian life in northern Iraq. Back to Aaron Hess, he noted, "The Turkish establishment sees growing Kurdish power in Iraq as one step down the road to a mass separatist movement of Kurds within Turkey itself, fighting to unify a greater Kurdistan. In late October 2007, Turkey's daily newspaper Hurriyet accused the prime minister of the KRG, Massoud Barzani, of turning the 'Kurdish dream' into a 'Turkish nightmare'."

Seyhmus Cakan (Reuters) notes the Turkish military continued air raids last night over northern Iraq and states this wave "marks a stark escalation of the 27-year-old conflict" between the government of Turkey and the PKK. AFP notes Turkish war planes continue bombing today "for a third straight day." Suzan Fraser (AP) quotes PKK spokesperson Ahmed Danis stating, "Our fighters left these bases a while ago and now they are in constant mobility. Therefore there were no casualties."

Meanwhile Aswat al-Iraq reports US Ambassador to Iraq James Jeffrey met in the KRG with KRG President Masoud Barzani to discuss a number of issues. The ongoing air raid assault has prompted only the mildest of critiques from Nouri al-Maliki. al-Maliki and his State of Law have had much harsher criticism for Iraq's president Jalal Talabani. Alsumaria TV reports that State of Law has taken offense to Talabani's statements that Monday's bombings throughout Iraq partly resulted from Iraq's inability to name people to the security posts.

Rushing this morning, sorry. The following community sites -- plus Antiwar.com, Adam vs The Man, Random Thoughts and PRI -- updated last night:



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State of the war state side

Today Stephen Lendman offers "RIP: America's Anti-War Movement" (Indybay):

According to United for Peace and Justice's (UFPJ) Michael McPhearson, it's partly partisan politics. Many anti-war protesters were Democrats. "Once Obama got into office, they kind of demobilized themselves," and America's major media provided no momentum to reinvigorate them.
"Because he's a Democrat," said McPhearson, "they don't want to oppose him in the same way as they opposed Bush. The politics of it allows him more breathing room when it comes to the wars."
Of course, UFPJ also has been less anti-war active under Obama than Bush, not quiescent, but much less resonant than through 2008.
UFPJ "calls for an immediate withdrawal of US and NATO forces from Afghanistan with a negotiated just settlement involving international parties, including regional neighbors" when condemnation is essential.
Moreover, it says nothing about war and occupation of Iraq, not enough about Afghanistan, the lawlessness of all US wars, why they're waged, other illegal wars against Libya, Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia, support for Israeli belligerence against Palestinians, as well as denouncing them all as Washington-sponsored imperial aggression.
Failure to do so betrays the trust of its member groups and followers. All US wars are illegal. America is responsible for daily crimes of war and against humanity in every theater. Exposing and denouncing them is the first crucial step to arousing public anger enough to stop them.

I'm so sick of the liars of United for Peace & Justice. The day after the 2008 election, they posted their litte 'everything is beautiful, go home' post and then they want to whine about the state of the movement today as if they had no part in it. For almost three years now, they have remained silent and done nothing. Not only have that not staged a convincing protest, they've failed to support the genuine efforts of people like Cindy Sheehan. They couldn't be bothered offering even just 'online support' to any of Cindy's actions.

They are the biggest frauds and fakes around. They're pariah in Democratic circles because they are such liars and no one wants to be around them when the truth-bombs explode -- REPEATING, closets are for wardrobes, step out of the political closet all damn ready -- and radicals look at them with disdain because you have to be a real bottom feeder Communist or Socialist to suck up to any Democratic politician, let alone one who is nothing but a corporatist War Hawk.

But that's what they did. Little Leslie Pacifica Board, Don't You Dare Ask Me About My Personal Political Beliefs Cagan and all the rest. The pathetics, the pretends, the fakes. They were nothing but an anti-Bush campaign machine. They're the sad little desperate to be popular girls who put out in a bid to fit in only to discover all that got them was a nasty reputation, a bad lay and a social disease or two.

On the financial costs of war, Walter Pincus (Washington Post) offers a history refresher:

Lawmakers might not want to levy a war tax to pay for the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, but their predecessors have always been willing to do so.

One tactic: Tax the rich.

Earlier this week, the Fine Print column noted that the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are the first American wars since the War of 1812 to not have been financed, at least in part, by a special tax. Since then, several readers have pointed out that the congressionally approved tax to pay for the Spanish-American War was considered a “luxury tax” on the wealthy.

In fact, it was a one-cent tax on any long-distance telephone call costing more than 15 cents, but it got its name because at the time phones were owned primarily by the well-to-do.



In a column on the financial costs of war, Linda Greene (Bloomington Alternative) writes about an October event:

Sheehan is the mother of Spc. Casey Sheehan, who was killed in action in the Iraq war on April 4, 2004. Since then, she has become an activist for peace and human rights.

Sheehan travels and speaks widely and has returned recently from France and Japan. The author of five books, she is currently writing her sixth, on Hugo Chavez, Venezuela and the Bolivarian revolution. She is also the host of her own radio show, Cindy Sheehan’s Soapbox.

For Sheehan, war is also an environmental issue. “The U.S. military is both the largest polluter in the world and the largest consumer of fossil fuel,” she says. “The current U.S. military missions not only pollute the world using conventional weaponry, but the war machine's increasing use of weapons and equipment enhanced with depleted uranium is also contaminating the planet and further compromising the delicate balance of life.”

This will be Sheehan’s first visit to Bloomington.

The talk, sponsored by the Bloomington Peace Action Coalition, the Bloomington branch of the Women’s International League for Peace & Freedom, the 9/11 Working Group of Bloomington, and the Just Peace Task Force and Green Sanctuary Task Force on Global Climate Change of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Bloomington, commemorates the 10th anniversary of the start of the Afghanistan war, Oct. 7.

Meanwhile Kimberly Hefling (AP) continues to expose systematic problems facing veterans today. Zooming in on wounded Staff Sgt Nicholas Lanier, Hefling illustrates how the 'stream-lined,' more responsive process is not. Lanier, like many wounded service members, may end up waiting two years for the discharge and the classification that allows him to know how much of his disability the government will be recognizing. Without that knowledge, it is impossible to plan for the future or to have some sense of ease about your post-service life.

We'll close with this from Debra Sweet's "Protest Convergence of War Criminals on NYC, September 2011" (World Can't Wait):

With the 10th anniversary of 9/11, NYC will be the destination of choice for major US war criminals, including Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and John Yoo.
These are the people who brought us torture, indefinite detention, and trillion-dollar wars that have claimed countless Afghani, Iraqi and US lives. They should be indicted and prosecuted for their crimes, not honored as speakers and special guests at symposia, memorials and fancy dinners. The brutality of the “war on terror”and the US wars of aggression are condemned both by the court of global public opinion and by international law, including the Geneva Conventions and the Convention against Torture.
People of conscience must insist on accountability for the actions of U.S. officials.
See warcriminalswatch.org for more:


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


































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Thursday, August 18, 2011

I Hate The War

This is on campaign politics.

Two groups of e-mails at the public account. The first wanting to know why we're endorsing Ron Paul?

I haven't endorsed anyone. Nor do I plan to endorse in the general election and didn't in 2008. I still haven't said who I voted for in that election (I've allowed that I either voted for Cynthia McKinney or Ralph Nader but that's as much as I've said or plan to). This is not a campaign politics site.

Ron Paul is mentioned and not nearly enough. If I wasn't having to grab Libya, he'd be mentioned more. But I can't try to follow Libya and also grab other things. Ron Paul is the only declared candidate at this point who promises to end the wars.

That is why he gets noted here.

If he were elected president, Ron Paul has said he would end the cops-of-the-world policy.

I don't need the e-mails telling me that Ron Paul really stands for this or that. Honestly, I don't see them. But they are irritating (in their number) to the people who work the e-mail accounts. (I go in and read quickly in the mornings Monday through Friday and I read on the weekends. That's really it for me. I get a tabulation of the day's e-mails from Shirley and Martha. That's what I'm using to reply in this entry.)

I'm really not concerned where Ron Paul stands on various issues. Our focus is the wars. As such, Ron Paul gets covered here.

As upset as some are about Ron Paul getting noted here, there are those who are furious with me because they've sent 'things on Iraq.' For example, seven insist, Michele Bachmann's 2006 statements!!!!!

Why the hell would I care what Michele Bachman said five years ago?

Is she an anti-war candidate?

No.

So why do I care what she says?

More importantly, to those e-mailing on this topic, why the hell do I care what you have to say?

In one case, a writer is promoting his own piece. I'm supposed to be blown away that you rip Michele Bachman apart for being pro-war?

You who haven't said a peep on the Iraq War in over four years?

You may think you've indicted Bachmann. But what you've really demonstrated is that the Iraq War was and remains a political football for you.

You had nothing to say about it for years after Bush was leaving the White House. But now you're suddenly interested in the Iraq War again so you can beat Michele Bachmann over the head with it? And you don't see that, in fact, the problem is you?

Michele Bachman is a War Hawk. As such, it's not incumbent upon me to cover her. I certainly don't need to include six-year-old statements by Bachman. If she'd been against the war and was now for it (a la Barack), that might qualify as news. If she'd been for but was now against it, that might qualify. But "Bachmann still supporting war"? That's obvious and it's known.

In 2007 and 2008, we tried to treat everyone fairly here. That meant if you were against the war, you got included (even Barack did). I don't like Dennis Kucinich. I'm sorry. I don't. But if you went back to the coverage prior to the Iowa caucuses, you'd think (as many reading did) that I was a Kucinich supporter. Kucinich got massive coverage here because he spoke about the war frequently. Bill Richardson got plenty of coverage here for the same reason.

Both offered real plans to end the war.

Barack didn't do that.

If you think about it, people who offer real plans to end the war get ridiculed (a point Ron Paul makes in this Justin Raimondo column). That's happening now with Ron Paul, it happened with Kucinich and, most should remember, it happened in 2004 with Howard Dean.

It never happened with Barack because everyone looked at the Carr Center War Hawks hovering and knew he wasn't a dove or that he would do just what Bush had done. (And that foreshadowin was certainly on the money.)

It's also true that in 2007 and this year, I've called out those who try to say, "Oh forget ___, they don't stand a chance." It is way too early for anyone to know who the front runners will be. People who says that ___ doesn't stand a chance are often just unwilling to do the work required to include ____.

Ava and I did a piece calling out the crap offered last Friday on The NewsHour (PBS). 20 minutes and 50 seconds of the show were spent 'covering' Republican candidates. But not one of those minutes bothered to inform you about any position a candidate had.

20 minutes-plus of news timethat dealt with nonsense and horse racing but forgot the actual issues?

How do you do that? Sadly, more and more outlets do that all the time.

We're not interested in mirroring that garbage here.


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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