Monday, February 13, 2011. Chaos and violence continue, more prep meetings
for a national conference, Iraqi women stage a demonstration, Barack needs more
billions for the Iraq War (that hasn't ended), an MIT professor embarrasses on
the public stage (calm down, it's not Noam Chomsky), and
more.
They grow 'em dumb at MIT. John Tirman thinks he has
something to say at the Huffington Post but he's just huffing and puffing.
He wants you to know that the Conflict Zone photo exhibit at New York City Fire
Museum, ignores Iraqi suffering. Does it? I don't know. I haven't toured the
exhibit. So I won't offer an opinion on it. John Tirman hasn't toured it
either but he saw a few photos online and that made an 'expert.' MIT grows 'em
dumb because it encourages stupidity, fearless stupidity. In Friday's snapshot we
noted four of five participants in the New York Times' Thursday "Room
for Debate" feature. Tirman notes it as well . . . in order to defend Barack
Obama.
Like most worthless whores of the last few years, he trashes the Clinton
administration because he thinks that makes him look like less of a whore and
independent. ("Look, I trashed a Demorat!") No, it doesn't. It's the second
oldest trick in the whore's book. (I believe the first oldest is stealing money
out of john's wallet while the john sleeps.) The most blessed thing about a
second Barack administration would be the absence of Hillary Clinton and the
inability of all these little pricks to continue to blame her for everything he
does. That's not me wishing for a second term for Barack, that's me saying, if
it happens, there's one positive aspect of it right there.
Tirman's just another cheap whore for Barack, unable and unwilling to
address reality. Pretending to give a damn about the dead in Iraq . . . as long
as he can pretend the dying stopped after Bully Boy Bush left the White House.
Since the US-withdrawal from Iraq approximately 500 Iraqis have
been killed across the country. This is the highest death and casualty toll in
the past five years. The recent attacks have mostly occurred in Shiite
neighborhoods and intensified a sectarian tension between Sunnis and Shiites.
This tension flamed up with the recent conflict between Sunni Arab Vice
President Al-Hashimi and Shiite PM Al-Maliki and has turned into a political
crisis. Al-Maliki has accused Al-Hashimi of assisting a terrorist car bombing
supposedly aimed to assassinate Al-Maliki. For that reason an arrest warrant has
been issued against Al-Hashimi after which he fled to Kurdistan. This has
agitated Al-Hashimi and Sunni Arab members of parliament who blame Al-Maliki's
political tendency to dominate power centers, rule extra-constitutionally, and
deny the rights of Sunni federated regions as in the case of
Kurdistan.
Tirman ignores all that. That someone at MIT could be as dishonest as
Tirman is very telling about the decay in US academia. Like a good little whore
for Barack, he wants to distract because if he can't go to "the war is illegal!"
and bash Bush for starting it, he might have to note that continuing an illegal
war is just as wrong -- something Barack did. So he ignores the arguments that
were put forward in the forum. He can't handle the arguments, his mind isn't
equipped for it. And in the process, the idiot allows the right wing to win.
That's not how we engaged on the left, by throwing up a lot a smoke and trying
to distract from the points being made. Tirman is not just dishonest, he's
embarrassing.
Nouri al-Maliki? He huffs, "They are not only upset about the hasty
retreat, but the residual support for Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whom they
find distasteful." It takes extreme stupidity or whoredom to be responsible for
that sentence. Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and many others are
calling out Nouri al-Maliki. But because some right-wingers and some centrists
also do, Tirman must reflexively take the opposing side? That's academically
and intellectually dishonest.
The dishonesty abounds. We'll take one paragraph as an example and break
it up into bits.
"Putting aside for a moment the fact that the timetable for withdrawal was
set by President Bush,"
He's referring to the SOFA (Status Of Forces Agreement) which extended the
US military occupation of Iraq from 2008 to 2011.
"the impossibility of extending that timeline foiled by the Haditha
massacre (the result of which is Iraq's refusal to sustain U.S. criminal
immunity),"
First, "the impossibility of extending that timeline foiled by . . ." What
the hell is he trying to say? Extending the timeline of the SOFA was an
impossibility that Haditha foiled? If it foiled the impossibility -- pay
attention, MIT -- that would mean the extension wasn't an impossibility.
Regardless of what he's trying to say, the Barack administration did
attempt to extend the SOFA, did attempt to enter into a new agreement and,
according to Michele Flournoy, is now back in negotiations with Iraq for a US
military presence. From the January 30th
snapshot:
Like many dabblers, he goes to Haditha for outrage when Haditha was only
one of the outrage and not even the most outrageous to Iraq. There's an Iraqi
on trial in the US. For a crime that is less than what was done to 14-year-old
Abeer and her family (in the US, the accused is accused of rape only -- not
gang-rape and multiple murders). That case is followed in the Iraqi media. The
anger over no one being put to death for the murder of a family of a four, for
the gang-rape of a 14-year-old girl, has not gone away. There's Abu Ghraib,
there's so much. But dabblers go with Haditha. It's a reference they can
sprinkle into their pre-written sermons.
"that Maliki's power was consolidated under Bush,"
In March 2010, Iraq held elections. This was followed by an eight-month
political stalemate because Nouri refused to surrender the post of prime
minister. He never would have been able to bring Iraq to a standstill for eight
months without the backing of the White House and that's President Barack
Obama's White House. Yes, Bully Boy Bush and company installed a thug they
thought would be an easy puppet and push through the oil & gas law they
wanted. No question of that. But Nouri al-Maliki was not the choice of the
Iraqi people in 2010. And Nouri could have been ousted if the process --
outlined in the Constitution -- had been followed. Instead, he was able to hang
onto a post because he had the White House backing. The Erbil Agreement reached
by the political blocs? The US government drafted whole portions of that.
"and that a major promise of Obama's 2008 election was withdrawal from
Iraq."
Was it a major promise in March of 2008 when Samantha Power revealed that
it wasn't a promise? Let's drop back to the March 7,
2008 snapshot:
Stephen Sackur: You said that he'll revisit it [the decision to
pull troops] when he goes to the White House. So what the American public
thinks is a commitment to get combat forces out within sixteen months, isn't a
commitment is it?
Samantha Power: You can't make a commitment in whatever month we're
in now, in March of 2008 about what circumstances are going to be like in
January 2009. We can'te ven tell what Bush is up to in terms of troops pauses
and so forth. He will of course not rely upon some plan that he's crafted as a
presidential candidate or as a US Senator.
The US still hasn't withdrawn from Iraq. Special Ops, the CIA, the FBI,
700 US service members as trainers (according to Tirman's beloved Nouri
al-Maliki), drones and the 17,000 brigade known as the 'diplomatic corps' of the
State Dept is not withdrawal. Barack did lie on the campaign trail in 2008, he
swore one brigade a month and it would start when he was sworn in, the first
thing he would do. And yet, that would have meant everyone out of Iraq in
2010. Barack didn't meet that promise.
"What is more troubling about the right-wing moaning is that they fail to
mention that eight-year war that just ravaged the country. "
What is most troubling about whores for Barack is that they want to pretend
that Iraq can now be ignored because they've got an election to whore for.
Violence is up in Iraq. There's a political crisis in Iraq. You think they're
outraged by Haditha? Did you miss their outrage over the US drones being flown
in their country? (The State Dept says they're controlling the drones but many
believe it's the CIA.)
Whores don't care about people, they just care about a person and they'll
lie for him or her and that's all they'll do, that's all they ever do. They
offer nothing to an honest debate because they hocked honesty at a pawn shop
years ago. If you doubt it, note how many times Tirman tells you what the photo
exhibit means -- the one he's never been to. The one he's seen just a few
photos of online. You try attending a class as a student and giving a critical
evaluation on, for example, Hesse's Steppenwolf after you admit you
haven't read the book and see how that goes over.
To be specific, the Pentagon's brand-new budget
request asks for $2.9 billion for what it calls
"Post-Operation NEW DAWN (OND)/Iraq Activities." That's almost as much money as
the Pentagon spends on Darpa, its mad-science arm. And there are practically no
U.S. troops in Iraq.
RT adds, "After 'ending' the
war last year, the US government handed Iraqi operations over to the State
Department. Three billion dollars -- the amount that the DoD wants for a war
they aren't waging -- makes up around one-ninth of the State Department's entire
annual budget. In 2012, the Pentagon had asked for $11 billion to fight the War
in Iraq -- which was, at the time, an actual war." The Defense Dept isn't the
only one sticking their greedy hands out for US taxpayer dollars. Nicole Gauette
(Bloomberg News) reports, "President Barack Obama's budget seeks
$8.2 billion in 'extraordinary and temporary' funding for State Department
responsibilities in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. The request comes on top of
the $43.4 billion proposed for the 'core' budget for the State Department and
the U.S. Agency for International Development, which manages foreign aid. As the
military has pulled out of Iraq and drawn down in Afghanistan, the
administration has turned to the State Department to oversee spending on
political, security and economic projects, such as the $1.8 billion for Iraq
police training and military assistance."
Aren't you glad Barack 'ended' the Iraq War and all those billions of US
taxpayer dollars stopped being spent on it? Oh, that's right, neither of those
things actually happened.
On other elements of the budget, specifically veterans issues, the office
of Senator Patty Murray, Chair of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, issues
the following.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Monday, February 13, 2012
Contact: Murray Press Office
(202) 224-2834
Senator Murray's Statement on President Obama's VA
Budget
(Washington, D.C.) -- Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray, Chairman of
the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee and the second-ranking Democrat on the
Senate Budget Committee, issued the following statement on the President's
Fiscal Year 2013 budget request for the Department of Veterans
Affairs.
"This is a budget that provides reassurance for our veterans in an
extremely difficult budget climate. It represents a 15% increase over the VA
budget enacted last year and provides critical help in the areas of mental
health care and getting our veterans back to work. As a major influx of Iraq and
Afghanistan veterans return home seeking care at the VA, there is no question
that the investments this budget makes are sorely needed.
"I will continue to work with the VA on the few concern areas I
have in this budget including in VA construction and maintenance. We must work
to ensure the VA has the facilities to provide the state-of-the-art care our
veterans deserve."
###
Communications Director
U.S. Senator Patty Murray
202-224-2834 - press office
202--224-0228 - direct
Staying on the topic of dollars, CNNMoney reports, "Exxon
Mobil is being shut out of bidding on the next round of oil and gas exploration
contracts in Iraq because of its decision to sign an exploration deal with
Kurdistan's regional government in the northern part of that country."
Apparently, they finally got tired of waiting for a reply to their strongly
worded letters -- all these months later. Back in October, ExxonMobil signed a
deal with the Kurdistan Regional Government. The central government out of
Baghdad has been whining ever since. Whinnd barking but doing nothing. November
27th, Ahmed
Rasheed (Reuters)
reported that the central government took 'action,' that the Minister
of Oil announced they'd sent ExxonMobil a letter -- and it wasn't their first
letter to the company. Minister Abdul-Kareem Luaibi was quoted stating, "So far
we have sent Exxon three letters and tomorrow we will send them another
confirmation letter seeking their response." They sent three letters over
approximately six weeks and ExxonMobil never responded to them so the new plan
was to send them a letter asking them why they weren't responding to the
previous three letters. He added, "We have not decided anything yet. We are
waiting for their response." During that time, public threats were made
about canceling the contract, forbidding ExxonMobil from doing business in Iraq
and more. This morning, Hassan
Hafidh (Wall St. Journal)
reported Hussein al-Shahristani, Deputy Prime Minster for Energy,
was declaring that ExxonMobil might be barred from the round of bidding
scheduled to take place in May. They've whined for months and at least they
finally did something. Not anything important, but something. Exxon Mobil is
now barred from an auction that Big Oil already saw as a flea market and were
intent on avoiding. As noted at Third yesterday:
Business and investment wise, money and business keeps going to the
north. ExxonMobil is already going with the Kurdistan region and Reuters
noted, "Total's chief executive said on Friday he
was considering possible investments in Kurdistan, something which previously
prompted the central Iraq government to bar companies from investing in the
south of the country, and added he did not plan to chase contracts in Baghdad's
next licensing round." Tara Patel (Bloomberg
News) notes the company is "Europe's
third-largest oil company" and that the three provinces which make up the
Kurdistan Regional Government are "home to about 40% of the country's 115
billion barrels of reserves". Carin Hall (Energy
Digital) explains, "Iraq opened up its vast
reserves of oil to foreign investment after the Gulf War, but many find
Baghdad's terms too stringent."
Dow Jones
speaks today with KBC Energy Economics analyst Samuel Ciszuk who explains
that the May auction will be for fixed-fee service contracts as opposed to
"industry-standard production sharing contracts, where the oil company owns a
portion of the oil in the ground and can profit from its sale" -- which may be
another reason Big Oil's not excited about the May auction. Again falling back to Third
yesterday:
Friday, Peg Mackey (Reuters) reported
that Iraq is attempting to increase sourthern Iraq oil output by 100,000 barrels
per day next month. This would result from a new floating port, one that
Aswat al-Iraq
reports is supposed to be "one of four
similar projects," according to the Ministry of Oil's Asim Jihad. Nouri
al-Maliki needs something and something to spin because he's not representing
Iraq very well in any manner.And Nouri tried to spin the new
port. Ben Lando and Ali Abu Iraq
(Iraq Oil Report) note that Nouri tried to stage a photo-op
yesterday at the port with assistants handing out flowers and flags right before
the cameras started clicking. But, also on Sunday,
Aswat al-Iraq reported MP Suzan
al-Saad stated that there are problems and demands regarding Basra that must be
addressed: "Some of the demands are for the services sector, as well as the
start in building the Greater Fao Port."
Nouri's hoping to increase his prestige but the reality is there's no
political gridlock in the KRG, they aren't trying to imprison rival politicians,
they sit on an estimated 40% of Iraq's oil and they make efforts at public
transparency. By contrast, the paranoid and unstable Nouri al-Maliki is
forever screaming "Ba'athist" when ordering mass arrests, runs secret prisons,
refuses to appoint a Minister of Defense, a Minister of Interior and a Minister
of National Security though they should have been named (per the Constitution)
no later than December 2010, pays thugs to harass Iraqi citizens who demonstrate
in Tahrir Square, is unable to pass an oil and gas law despite having been
installed as prime minister in 2006 to do just that, and worse.
And at some point, Iraq's going to need to develop other revenues.
Dropping back to the November
21st snapshot: Sounding alarms
over the focus/reliance on oil is Iraq's Sunni vice president. KUNA reports, "Iraqi Vice-President Tareq Al-Hashimi warned on
Sunday his country might witness a major financial crisis if oil prices fall in
2012 to an expected USD 85 per barrel. The annual budget for Iraq depends
entirely on oil sales and imports, Al-Hashimi said during his participation in
the 5th political forum of the Renewal Movement, adding that next year's budget
has been estimated at USD 112 billion." The Voice of
Russia adds, "Speaking on
Sunday, the minister argued for speedy economic reconstruction and
diversification away from oil and natural gas."
Any prestige that Nouri might be hoping for would plummet were oil prices
to drop.
Violence hasn't dropped. Reuters notes a
Kirkuk sticky bombing injured a teacher and two other people, a second Kirkuk
sticky bombing injured a police officer and a Muqdadiya sticky bombing injured a
Sahwa ("Awakening," "Sons Of Iraq"). In addition, Aswat al-Iraq
reports Sahwa leader Saad al-Shamarri and two of his bodyguards were shot
dead in Anbar Province (two more guards were injured) when unknown gunmen
attacked their car. Aswat al-Iraq notes that this was the tenth known
attempt on Saad al-Shamarri's life.
political crisis? The Jordan Times explains: Today, the country is deeply divided along sectarian
lines. The government of Prime Minister Nouri Maliki remains hostage to its own
ambition to reign unchallenged. Maliki, a Shiite, has centralised decisive power
in himself and is now pursuing a campaign to stamp out all Sunni challenges to
his reign.His orders that saw
hundreds of Sunnis belonging to the now defunct Baathist Party being detained
and his push to have the vice president, Tareg Al Hashim, tried on "terrorism"
charges and Saleh Al Mutlaq, the deputy prime minister, expelled from the
Cabinet for criticising him are all part of that campaign.An arrest warrant has been issued for Hashimi, and 16
of his bodyguards have been arrested.Over the weekend, another
meet-up for the much anticipated national conference took place. Since December,
President Jalal Talabani and Speaker of Parliament Osama al-Nujaifi have been
calling for a national conference to address the political crisis. All that has
taken place thus far is a handful of planning sessions. Omar Abdel-Latif
(Al Sabaah) reports that
Talabani and al-Nujaifi meet with Nouri and representatives for the National
Alliance, Iraqiya and the Kurdish Alliance. The meeting is supposed to address
various proposals put forward in written format by various political blocs. This
prep meeting will be followed by . . . another prep meeting currently scheduled
for Wednesday. Ayad al-Tamimi (Al Mada) reports that al-Nujaifi
declared of yesterday's meeting that the proposals from Iraqiya and the Kurdish
Alliance were discussed. In Iraqiya's written proposals, they address the issues
of Tareq al-Hashemi and Saleh al-Mutlaq -- issues Nouri's State of Law has
insisted will not be addressed at the national conference. Dar Addustour notes that the issues
are pretty much tabled with agreement from the majority that al-Hashemi and
al-Mutlaq will not be addressed at the national conference. Aswat al-Iraq
reports that the Sadrist bloc is stating that Iraqiya has agreed to withdraw
discussions of al-Hashemi and al-Mutlaq from the national conference. Nevzat Hmedin (Al Mada) focuses on the leader of
the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq's Ammar al-Hakim who is stating that the
paper his bloc (part of the National Alliance and, along with Nouri and Moqtada
al-Sadr, one of the major players in the National Alliance slate) presented
addresses the issues of provincial powers and rights, specifically that it calls
for increased powers for the provincial councils and for the provinces to
receive a larger slice of the national budget. al-Hakim also states that Ninveh
Province council members should end their ongoing boycott of local government.
From the political crisis to the human condition, Naomi
Wolf (Al Jazeera) notes Iraqi film maker Oday Rasheed and his latest
film Qarantina which played at the
Museum of Modern Art last month: Now Rasheed reflects on his country's turn toward
religious extremism: he describes a pre-invasion Iraq in which women were
professionals and fairly emancipated, whereas now women wear headscarves under
pressure, "for a peaceful life". His friend, a young Iraqi actress named Zahra
Zubaidi, had to flee the Middle East after having played a rape victim in Brian
de Palma's film Redacted; she has since emigrated to New York.Constant intimidation by religious extremists and
political factions is the intellectual's fate in Iraq today. And yet Rasheed
refuses to be discreet: "Everything I believe, I believe in it," he says. "I
cannot lie or not answer the questions."Iraqi women led a
protest for their rights and that was significant. You know it was significant
because the New York Times never said a
word about it.
Saturday, Al Mada reported a group of women
demonstrated in Iraq on Baghdad's Mutanabi Street -- a large number of women
from the picture -- to salute Iraq women and the pioneering Iraqi women of the
20th century feminist movement. The women noted the widespread discrimination
against women (illegal under the country's Constitution). Dr. Buthaina Sharif
made remarks about how the rights of women are a cause for all men and women to
share. Dr. Sharif saluted Paulina Hassoun who, in 1923, edited Iraq's first
feminist magazine Layla ("On the way to
the revival of the Iraqi woman"). She spoke to Iraq's long history of social
progress in the 20th century and decried the violence aimed at so many women
today. (The UN estimates that one out of five Iraqi women is a victim of
domestic violence.) Those demonstrating had passed a list of
recommendations. 1) The Constitution must
be followed.2) The government needs
to establish a fund for women -- women who are widows and women whose husbands
have left them.3) Publis assistance
for the education of girls to prevent them from being forced to drop
out.4) Subsidies for young families
which would encourage marriage and building families.5) Better housing for women and priority on housing
lists.6) Training sessions should be
opened to women and job creation should keep their qualifications in
mind.7) Double the amount guaranteed
by the ration card.8) Efforts to
discredit women by sullying their names with false rumors should result in
prosecution in court.9) Freedom and
unity is for all and that includes women.10) Restore normal life by providing potable water
(safe to drink) and electricity.11)
create a Higher National Committee of women and men from different backgrounds
and ages
Nora Khaled
Mahmoud and Mahmoud Raouf filed a follow up piece for Al Mada on the demonstration noting
that it included intellectuals and activists and could said to have been
prompted by the Minster for Women's recent remarks that men and women were not
equal and her insistance upon dictating how women dress. The note Iraqi women
spoke of women's history being a continuum of two experiences: Injustice and
triumph. Women face injustice and they triumph over it. They declared that
democracy is traveling around the world and that Iraq must be a good model for
it. They noted that, throughout the women's movement in Iraq, women and men have
taken part in the struggle for equality and that, as early as the 20s and 30s,
Iraqi clerics joined in the demands for equality for all. Women, they insisted,
must not lose their freedom and that this is even more clear when they hear the
Minister for Women publicly declaring she does not believe in equality. While
that's her opinion, the women state, that's not the opinion of alll women and
it's not the opinion of the Constitution. Journalist and feminist Nermin Mufti
declared that civil liberties and personal freedoms are declining in Iraq and
that the Minister for Women should represent the interests of Iraqi women and
seek to claim the rights guaranteed to women, not rob them of their rights
little by little. That protest may kick off this month's protests in
Baghdad. Dar Addustour reports that Iraqi
intellectuals are calling for a protest on the first anniversary of protests led
by Iraqi youths in Baghdad's Tahrir Square. This kicked off Friday protests
which do continue. A very small number currently because Nouri al-Maliki's hired
thugs swarm Tahrir Square and shout down Iraqi citizens. | 
