They got a ton of Emmy nominations, for example.
But the cast did not have one break out character.
Please read Ava and C.I.'s "Media: Truth is hard in thoughtless times" because it documents what a lousy season SNL had.
I didn't realize that. I knew it was a bad show this year.
But as Ava and C.I. point out, they had a cast of 13 plus 3 featured players.
But the only thing anyone noticed was Donald Trump and Sean Spicer.
And the cast didn't play them.
Alec Baldwin played Donald Trump and Melissa McCarthy played Sean Spicer.
The cast was worthless.
The show was worthless.
It's a great piece and -- inside information -- this was a review of Jennifer Jason Leigh's NETFLIX show that they love.
But there was a part in there that we all responded to, 2 sentences, and they (Ava and C.I.) said, "Hold on, we're going to go in a different direction."
Then they wrote that piece.
Also please immediately read Trina's "Watch out for The Bimbo Brigade" if you haven't already.
We -- women -- are in charge of a few periodicals.
But what are we doing with our power?
Being bimbos -- at MOTHER JONES, THE PROGRESSIVE and THE NATION.
"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):
Wednesday, April 16, 2017. Chaos and violence continues and look who's concerned about Kurdish independence.
REUTERS has filed what they're boasting is a "one minute read."
Me? I'm marveling over the fact that it took 3 people to produce it: Ece Toksabay, Turvan Gumrukcu and David Dolan.
The only thing the headline doesn't tell you is that the remark was made to TRT HABER.
What does he mean?
Far be it from REUTERS to offer that.
They neither quote his exact words or go beyond the headline.
A good guess -- but a guess none the less -- would be this is more nonsense from Turkey and from Mevlut Cavusoglu.
AFP quotes him stating, "In that country (Iraq), which has been through so many problems, a referendum on independence can make the situation even worse. God forbid, it could even bring it to civil war."
Oh, he's just concerned about Iraq.
How sweet.
To provide a bit of context on Cavusoglu, in March the Netherlands announced he would not be allowed to land in their country. In May, he called for the US government to replace Brett McGurk as special envoy (he insisted McGurk supported the PKK and YPG -- apparently he was unaware of Brett's youthful involvement with the YMCA). And, of course, Cavusoglu made a spectacle of himself whining about the 'treatment' of Turkish bodyguards (the bodyguards were attacking peaceful protesters in DC).
So that's the 'diplomatic' Cavusoglu.
More context?
For over a decade now, Turkey has been bombing northern Iraq -- killing farmers and villagers mainly.
Turkey has long maintained that every strike killed PKK fighters and nothing but PKK fighters. As for the PKK, Aaron Hess (International Socialist Review) described the PKK 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."
Cavusoglu represents the faction that has oppressed Kurds in Turkey. They fear that if the KRG becomes independent, Kurds in Turkey will press for their own rights.
Kurds are discriminated against in Turkey -- if they're lucky, that's all they face. They often are also the targets of violence.
Rather than address their own problem, they now want to whine about what might happen in Iraq.
They really need to address the oppression they have imposed on their own country (I'm referring to the Kurds but you can include the more recent targeting of the press and dissidents as well).
Instead, they want to whine.
Let's drop back to the February 13, 2016 snapshot:
US House Rep Paul Cook: Picking up on that question of the Turks and the Kurds, point blank, is there any hope for a separate homeland for the Kurdistan? I don' think geography favors it. But we've disappointed the Kurds so many times and after all of their fighting and everything else, particularly with the pressure with the Kurds -- I just don't . . . I think we're going to betray them once again. Can you comment on that?
Special Envoy Brett McGurk: Well the Kurds -- and I've dealt with my friends, the Kurds, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq for almost a decade now. And you're right, there's a historical memory of what happened to the Kurds after WWI which is something I think we all have to recognize and be sympathetic to. Uhm, the Kurds in northern Syria we've developed a relationship with over the last 18 months or so in the counter-ISIL campaign. I was able to go into northern Syria last week and meet a number of them. And they have the same -- it's a very similar historical narrative. Uhm, however, at this moment in time, creating new, independent states is not something that I think would be particularly stabilizing. So when it comes to northern Iraq, and the Kurds, as I mentioned, I think before something like that can be discussed in a serious manner, first you have to get ISIS off the southern border, it's all jihad-istan on the entire southern border of northern Iraq and the Kurdistan region. Second, the economic situation has to stabilize. And, third, the political situation has to stabilize. So right now, I think the Kurds of northern Iraq, uh, and recognize this. Nobody is trying to do the impossible and create a unified Iraq that is a glowing democracy. But a federal Iraq, which is defined in their constitution, which empowers local leaders, empowers the Sunnis in the provinces, empowers the Kurds in northern Iraq, empowers the Shia in southern Iraq is something that's realistic, is something that is in Iraq's constitution and something that we support.
The US has repeatedly attempted to thwart any move towards Kurdish independence.
As we noted Saturday, ALSUMARIA reported that Hoshyar al-Zebari stated today that, despite US objection, the referendum will be held on September 25th. Monday, Mythili Sampathkumar (INDEPENDENT) reported), "Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had asked Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) President Massoud Barzani to delay the 25 September vote because America fears it would detract from "more urgent priorities" in the region, such as defeating the Isis terror group. "
Yes, it's never a good time for the KRG.
It's always been that way, from the US government's perspective.
The betrayals and lies go back decades.
You can't discuss the US government's relationship with the Kurds seriously without referenceing the Pike Report which the US Congress produced but then quickly decided not to release. It was leaked to the press (by CBS NEWS' Daniel Schorr after CBS NEWS questioned whether or not to report on it) and, February 16, 1976, The Village Voice published Aaron Latham's "Introduction to the Pike Papers." Latham explained:
In 1972, Dr. Henry Kissinger met with the Shah of Iran, who asked the U.S. to aid the Kurds in their rebellion against Iraq, an enemy of the Shah. Kissinger later presented the proposal to President Nixon who approved what would become a $16 million program. Then John B. Connally, the former Nixon Treasury Secretary, was dispatched to Iran to inform the Shah, one oil man to another.
The committee report charges that: "The President, Dr. Kissinger and the foreign head of state [the Shah] hoped our clients would not prevail. They preferred instead that the insurgents simply continue a level of hostilities sufficient to sap the resources of our ally's neighboring country [Iraq]. The policy was not imparted to our clients, who were encouraged to continue fighting. Even in the context of covert action, ours was a cynical enterprise."
During the Arab-Israeli war, when the Kurds might have been able to strike at a distracted Iraqi government, Kissinger, according to the report, "personally restrained the insurgents from an all-out offensive on the one occasion when such an attack might have been successful."
Then, when Iran resolved its border dispute with Iraq, the U.S. summarily dropped the Kurds. And Iraq, knowing aid would be cut off, launched a search-and-destroy campaign the day after the border agreement was signed.
A high U.S. official later explained to the Pike committee staff: "Covert action should not be confused with missionary work."
That is the root and start of a relationship where the US government repeatedly used and misled the Kurdish people and repeatedly lied and broke promises.
Since 2003, the broken promises have increased.
The KRG needs to do what the people of the KRG want.
A referendum is scheduled for September 25th. The Kurds need to decide for themselves. They do not need 'advice' from the US or Turkey. Self-determination.
How do you leave that out?
The bombs continue to be dropped on Iraq.
Balint Szlanko and Qassim Abdul-Zahra (AP) report:
Maher Chmaytelli (REUTERS) adds, "The town, which had about 200,000 residents before falling to Islamic State, experienced cycles of sectarian violence between Sunnis and Shi'ites after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, and has produced some of Islamic State's most senior commanders."
In other news, WSWS is among the websites currently targeted with censorship. They note:
Nearly 1,000 people from all over the world have signed the petition to oppose Google censorship.
Here is what some have said:
Sincerely,
The World Socialist Web Site
The following community sites updated:
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REUTERS has filed what they're boasting is a "one minute read."
Me? I'm marveling over the fact that it took 3 people to produce it: Ece Toksabay, Turvan Gumrukcu and David Dolan.
The only thing the headline doesn't tell you is that the remark was made to TRT HABER.
What does he mean?
Far be it from REUTERS to offer that.
They neither quote his exact words or go beyond the headline.
A good guess -- but a guess none the less -- would be this is more nonsense from Turkey and from Mevlut Cavusoglu.
AFP quotes him stating, "In that country (Iraq), which has been through so many problems, a referendum on independence can make the situation even worse. God forbid, it could even bring it to civil war."
Oh, he's just concerned about Iraq.
How sweet.
To provide a bit of context on Cavusoglu, in March the Netherlands announced he would not be allowed to land in their country. In May, he called for the US government to replace Brett McGurk as special envoy (he insisted McGurk supported the PKK and YPG -- apparently he was unaware of Brett's youthful involvement with the YMCA). And, of course, Cavusoglu made a spectacle of himself whining about the 'treatment' of Turkish bodyguards (the bodyguards were attacking peaceful protesters in DC).
So that's the 'diplomatic' Cavusoglu.
More context?
For over a decade now, Turkey has been bombing northern Iraq -- killing farmers and villagers mainly.
Turkey has long maintained that every strike killed PKK fighters and nothing but PKK fighters. As for the PKK, Aaron Hess (International Socialist Review) described the PKK 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."
Cavusoglu represents the faction that has oppressed Kurds in Turkey. They fear that if the KRG becomes independent, Kurds in Turkey will press for their own rights.
Kurds are discriminated against in Turkey -- if they're lucky, that's all they face. They often are also the targets of violence.
Rather than address their own problem, they now want to whine about what might happen in Iraq.
They really need to address the oppression they have imposed on their own country (I'm referring to the Kurds but you can include the more recent targeting of the press and dissidents as well).
Instead, they want to whine.
Let's drop back to the February 13, 2016 snapshot:
US House Rep Paul Cook: Picking up on that question of the Turks and the Kurds, point blank, is there any hope for a separate homeland for the Kurdistan? I don' think geography favors it. But we've disappointed the Kurds so many times and after all of their fighting and everything else, particularly with the pressure with the Kurds -- I just don't . . . I think we're going to betray them once again. Can you comment on that?
Special Envoy Brett McGurk: Well the Kurds -- and I've dealt with my friends, the Kurds, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq for almost a decade now. And you're right, there's a historical memory of what happened to the Kurds after WWI which is something I think we all have to recognize and be sympathetic to. Uhm, the Kurds in northern Syria we've developed a relationship with over the last 18 months or so in the counter-ISIL campaign. I was able to go into northern Syria last week and meet a number of them. And they have the same -- it's a very similar historical narrative. Uhm, however, at this moment in time, creating new, independent states is not something that I think would be particularly stabilizing. So when it comes to northern Iraq, and the Kurds, as I mentioned, I think before something like that can be discussed in a serious manner, first you have to get ISIS off the southern border, it's all jihad-istan on the entire southern border of northern Iraq and the Kurdistan region. Second, the economic situation has to stabilize. And, third, the political situation has to stabilize. So right now, I think the Kurds of northern Iraq, uh, and recognize this. Nobody is trying to do the impossible and create a unified Iraq that is a glowing democracy. But a federal Iraq, which is defined in their constitution, which empowers local leaders, empowers the Sunnis in the provinces, empowers the Kurds in northern Iraq, empowers the Shia in southern Iraq is something that's realistic, is something that is in Iraq's constitution and something that we support.
The US has repeatedly attempted to thwart any move towards Kurdish independence.
As we noted Saturday, ALSUMARIA reported that Hoshyar al-Zebari stated today that, despite US objection, the referendum will be held on September 25th. Monday, Mythili Sampathkumar (INDEPENDENT) reported), "Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had asked Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) President Massoud Barzani to delay the 25 September vote because America fears it would detract from "more urgent priorities" in the region, such as defeating the Isis terror group. "
Yes, it's never a good time for the KRG.
It's always been that way, from the US government's perspective.
The betrayals and lies go back decades.
You can't discuss the US government's relationship with the Kurds seriously without referenceing the Pike Report which the US Congress produced but then quickly decided not to release. It was leaked to the press (by CBS NEWS' Daniel Schorr after CBS NEWS questioned whether or not to report on it) and, February 16, 1976, The Village Voice published Aaron Latham's "Introduction to the Pike Papers." Latham explained:
In 1972, Dr. Henry Kissinger met with the Shah of Iran, who asked the U.S. to aid the Kurds in their rebellion against Iraq, an enemy of the Shah. Kissinger later presented the proposal to President Nixon who approved what would become a $16 million program. Then John B. Connally, the former Nixon Treasury Secretary, was dispatched to Iran to inform the Shah, one oil man to another.
The committee report charges that: "The President, Dr. Kissinger and the foreign head of state [the Shah] hoped our clients would not prevail. They preferred instead that the insurgents simply continue a level of hostilities sufficient to sap the resources of our ally's neighboring country [Iraq]. The policy was not imparted to our clients, who were encouraged to continue fighting. Even in the context of covert action, ours was a cynical enterprise."
During the Arab-Israeli war, when the Kurds might have been able to strike at a distracted Iraqi government, Kissinger, according to the report, "personally restrained the insurgents from an all-out offensive on the one occasion when such an attack might have been successful."
Then, when Iran resolved its border dispute with Iraq, the U.S. summarily dropped the Kurds. And Iraq, knowing aid would be cut off, launched a search-and-destroy campaign the day after the border agreement was signed.
A high U.S. official later explained to the Pike committee staff: "Covert action should not be confused with missionary work."
That is the root and start of a relationship where the US government repeatedly used and misled the Kurdish people and repeatedly lied and broke promises.
Since 2003, the broken promises have increased.
The KRG needs to do what the people of the KRG want.
A referendum is scheduled for September 25th. The Kurds need to decide for themselves. They do not need 'advice' from the US or Turkey. Self-determination.
How do you leave that out?
The bombs continue to be dropped on Iraq.
IS conflict: Iraqi jets bomb Tal Afar ahead of ground assault
Balint Szlanko and Qassim Abdul-Zahra (AP) report:
Thousands of Iraqis have fled an Islamic State-held town west of Mosul as Iraqi and coalition warplanes step up strikes ahead of a ground offensive to drive out the militants.
Tal Afar and the surrounding area is one of the last pockets of IS-held territory in Iraq after victory was declared in July in Mosul, the country's second-largest city. The town, about 150 kilometers (93 miles) east of the Syrian border, sits along a major road that was once a key IS supply route.
Maher Chmaytelli (REUTERS) adds, "The town, which had about 200,000 residents before falling to Islamic State, experienced cycles of sectarian violence between Sunnis and Shi'ites after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, and has produced some of Islamic State's most senior commanders."
In other news, WSWS is among the websites currently targeted with censorship. They note:
Nearly 1,000 people from all over the world have signed the petition to oppose Google censorship.
Here is what some have said:
- I'm against any kind of censorship on the Internet. It should be a free space and not controlled by corporations. -- Ricardo, Portugal
- Information should be free and the reader should have the choice whether to believe it. -- Muhammad, Pakistan
- Disallowing the dissemination of information critical to exposing the class nature of all political issues we face represents a leap towards authoritarianism. -- John, United States
- Internet censorship must stop... freedom of speech and access to information on the web! -- Srilal, Sri Lanka
Sincerely,
The World Socialist Web Site
The following community sites updated:
- jewel11 hours ago
- She never goes away11 hours ago
- Free speech12 hours ago
- Good for Jake Tapper12 hours ago
- Rukmini Callimachi = Judith Miller13 hours ago
- Racist Amy Goodman13 hours ago
- Watch out for The Bimbo Brigade13 hours ago
- I stand with the ACLU13 hours ago
- Manipulation?13 hours ago
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iraq iraq iraq iraq iraq iraq iraq iraq iraq iraq iraq iraqiraq iraq iraq iraq iraq iraq
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