Friday, January 19, 2018

The Moon and Mars

Will we live on the Moon or Mars?

I think so, someday.  Maybe many years after I've died.

How would we do that?

Kirsten Korosec (FORTUNE) has an interesting article:
 

Getting to Mars is one challenge, but figuring out how to live there, even for a little while, is another massive hurdle.
But NASA is on the case. The organization is experimenting with a new power source—called the Kilopower reactor—that it says could provide safe, efficient, and plentiful energy needed for future robotic and human space exploration missions. Think of it as a tiny nuclear reactor available in two sizes: one kilowatt or 10 kilowatts.
This week, NASA provided an update on the project, which kicked off in 2015 as part of the Game Changing Development program. It’s led by the agency’s Glenn Research Center, in partnership with NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama, the Los Alamos National Laboratory, the Nevada National Security Site, and the Y-12 National Security Complex.
Would you live on the Moon or Mars?

I would, if I could.  My kids would have to be all grown, of course.  I wouldn't make them go.  If they wanted to go along, great, but otherwise, no.

I think it would be exciting.

Probably dangerous too if you were part of the first wave.

But I think it would be exciting and wonderful.



"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):
Friday, January 19, 2018.  Chaos and violence continue and it's getting harder and harder for Hayder al-Abadi to spin present day Iraq as 'success.'




 Jan 17
I'm under 25 & I know who Ashleigh Banfield is. She was the reporter on NYC streets during 9/11. She interviewed Taliban prisoners during the Iraq War. & She's the woman who made sure Brock Turner's mugshot was on CNN. IDK who TF Katie Way is, but she's no journalist.
9 replies90 retweets419 likes







Actually, Jailain, I'm not sure you know who Ashleigh Banfield is.

Her most courageous moment was regarding the Iraq War -- and that was calling out the coverage of it.

You do mention the Iraq War but I'm not sure you understand that either.  Taliban?

Did you study with Dick Cheney?  Was Bully Boy Bush your tutor?

The Taliban is in Afghanistan.

As for Katie Way, I detest the article she produced (the bad date = abuse nonsense).  But she is a journalist.  And the fact that you're Tweeting about her underscores that.

And I doubt Katie Way would confuse Afghanistan with Iraq.


Iraq where the greed keeps the foreign fighters on the ground . . .


 24 minutes ago
BP strikes deal with Iraq to exploit giant Kirkuk field. Agreement cements Baghdad control over Iraqi Kurdistan after its failed independence bid.
1 reply8 retweets5 likes







The greedy swoop in.  Iraq's a country with double-digit unemployment (16% is the official number).  An oil rich country that can't take care of its citizens.  Where does the money go?  Don't ask Hayder al-Abadi -- he's spent three years now insisting he was going to fight corruption.  They can do show trials of Sunnis they wrongly call members of ISIS and carry those trials out in 15 minutes but somehow it's different for the corrupt.  Probably the difference results from the fact that the ones stealing from Iraq are the political class.


A country of widows and orphans.  That's what the Iraq War has created and continues to create.


Hayder's taking to crowing a lot lately.


 Jan 18
The number of Iraqis returning to their home has now surpassed the number of IDPs in Iraq. With the support of its local and international partners, the will continue working to ensure the safe and dignified return of all displaced Iraqis to their homes and communities
4 replies43 retweets67 likes






He forgets that many of the displaced have been forced to return and forced to return to unsafe areas.

He also forgets the issue of the ages of the displaced.


REUTERS reports:

About half the 2.6 million people displaced in Iraq after a three-year war with Islamic State militants are children and persisting violence hampers efforts to ease their suffering, the United Nations said on Friday.
While the Baghdad government last month declared victory over Islamic State after wresting back almost all the territory IS seized in 2014, persistent bombing and shooting attacks make it difficult to rebuild the lives of displaced people, according to UNICEF, the U.N. children's agency.
"We believe that as a result of the conflict, a lack of investment over the years, and the poverty ... that there are 4 million children now in need across Iraq," said Peter Hawkins, UNICEF chief representative in the country.


Not really a success for Hayder, no matter how he spins it.

B-b-b-ut at least he vanquished ISIS, right?

Uh . . . no.

From the US Defense Dept this morning:




Strikes in Iraq
There were no reported strikes conducted in Iraq on Jan. 18, 17 and 14.
On Jan. 16 near Rutbah in Iraq, coalition military forces conducted a strike consisting of three engagements against ISIS targets, destroying three ISIS underground facilities and a generator.
On Jan. 15 near Rutbah in Iraq, coalition military forces conducted a strike consisting of one engagement against ISIS targets, destroying two ISIS weapons caches.
On Jan. 13 near Mosul in Iraq, coalition military forces conducted a strike consisting of one engagement against ISIS targets, destroying an ISIS tunnel.
On Jan. 12 near Tuz in Iraq, coalition military forces conducted a strike consisting of three engagements against an ISIS tactical unit.

Yes, the US continues to bomb Iraq.


It says it's targeting ISIS.

That sort of contradicts Hayder's boasts of triumph.

As does the continued violence.  WORLD BULLETIN reports, "At least three civilians were killed Friday in two separate bombings in Iraq’s Baghdad and Diyala provinces, according to local security sources."  And the death toll has now climbed to four with at least two people left injured.


'Success'?  Does that also include the continued targeting of civilians by Hayder's militias?



 17 hours ago
and have seen widespread violations against Kurds since the military takeover of the disputed areas by the Iraqi army and Iranian-backed Hashd al-Shaabi militias in mid-October.
6 replies39 retweets69 likes








The more time passes, the less impressive he comes off.

Which is why he wants the elections to be held in May and not postponed.

On the elections, MIDDLE EAST MONITOR reports:
The Iraqi parliament has failed to set a new date for the upcoming legislative elections, Iraqi media sources reported yesterday.
Media sources quoted Members of the Parliament (MPs) as saying that yesterday’s session was devoted to a secret ballot on holding the elections on either 12 May, the date that was announced by the Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi, or in early December 2018.
During the session, Kurds and Shiites MPs both stressed the importance of holding elections on time, while Sunnis argued that it should be delayed.
Of the 260 MPs in attendance, 149 suggested a secret vote on the matter, but Shiite MPs objected, arguing it was illegal.
Parliament speaker Salim Al-Jabouri, a Sunni, decided at the end of yesterday’s session to postpone the voting session to next Saturday, after the “secret voting to delay the elections failed.”


If elections are going to take place in May, this vote needs to happen soon.  In the past, three months has been used as the minimum required to prepare for elections.  Electronic voting -- if paper ballots are indeed out the window in Iraq as some insist -- will not mean less time required since there will need to be training and planning to utilize those.

The US Embassy in Baghdad issued the following yesterday:


 The U.S. government strongly supports holding the Iraqi national elections in May 2018, in line with the Iraqi constitution.  Postponing the elections would set a dangerous precedent, undermining the constitution and damaging Iraq’s long-term democratic development.
To that end, the United States is providing assistance that will help ensure that all Iraqi voices are heard and counted, including the approximately 2.6 million Iraqis who remain displaced from their homes in the liberated areas.  USAID is assisting in the training of local civil society groups in election monitoring and providing Iraq’s Independent High Electoral Commission (IHEC) with six elections advisors who will help IHEC strengthen its electoral systems, personnel, and processes in the following ways:
  • Enfranchise internally displaced Iraqis by focusing on voter registration and ensuring electronic voting systems are effective.
  • Improve provincial electoral administrative capacity to support voting in recently liberated areas.
  • Help the new IHEC Board of Commissioners finalize a sound operational plan for the May 2018 elections.


Support for Iraq’s democratic institutions is a key part of the United States’ ongoing commitment to a federal, democratic, prosperous, and unified Iraq.  By exercising their constitutional right to vote, Iraqis will signal their commitment to governance through peaceful processes rather than through violence.


The following community sites -- plus Jody Watley, PACIFICA EVENING NEWS and LATINO USA --  updated:



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Thursday, January 18, 2018

Bayard

 14 hours ago
Incidents from the archives and his file underscore civil rights icon ’s complexity
3 retweets2 likes
 
 



How sad but how expected.

Rustin stood for something once upon a time -- or pretended he did.

Along came the neocon and -- CHOO! CHOO! -- Bayard was on board.

He didn't have a whole lot of firm principles so it's not really a surprise that he'd end up doing something like that.

I'm not a big fan.

I'm also not a big enemy.

Bayard and the Civil Rights Movement, for example?

I can understand his position.

I disagree with him.  (I believe that quotas were intended to level the playing field and I support that.)

I do not call him a "sell out" or anything similar.

We have different positions.

But we both want the same thing.


"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):
Thursday, January 18, 2018.  The Iraq War continues, corporations continue to get their claws into Iraq, a scramble in advance of May's planned elections takes place, and much more.


 18 hours ago
Smiling ferociously while getting anti cancer treatment
113 replies42 retweets642 likes





Justin Raimondo is a Libertarian who is the co-founder and editorial director of ANTIWAR.COM.  He is fighting cancer in addition to his other duties.


 29 minutes ago
Member of Congress who spends all day on Twitter attacking Trump says he's still oppose him even if "he could cure cancer." Ted, you're incurable. I -- who really do have cancer -- am not. I live to see crazed power-hungry partisans like you defeated.l

This poll confirms can do very bad things and his base sticks with him. But it also shows the flip side. He could cure cancer and majority will still oppose him because of his unstable behavior. Most voters' views are locked in. That means Dems will win the House …
1 reply5 retweets12 likes







Justin has been against the Iraq War all along.  In addition, ANTIWAR.COM is one of the few sites that can say they never forgot the Iraq War.  THE PROGRESSIVE can't say that.  THE NATION can't say that.  IN THESE TIMES -- does IN THESE TIMES even know wars are going on?  Do they not grasp the class issues at play?  So many long ago decided to pretend the Iraq War ended or never happened.

Not only did it happen, it continues.  Earlier this month, Spc Javion Shavonte Sullivan became the 22nd US service member to die in Iraq since August of 2014.





  1.  Jan 10
RIP US ARMY Spc. Javion Shavonte Sullivan, 24, of Fort Mill, South Carolina; died Jan. 8 in Al Anbar Province, Iraq
3 replies34 retweets60 likes


 Jan 10
Spc. Javion Shavonte Sullivan, 24, of Fort Mill, South Carolina, died Jan. 8 in Al Anbar Province, Iraq, from a non-combat related incident.
1 retweet1 like







THE DAYTONA BEACH NEWS-JOURNAL notes, "In operations related to Iraq, a total of 4,534 members of the U.S. military have died. Another 32,310 U.S. service personnel have been wounded in action."



 13 hours ago
Regime change has failed. Evidence on the ground shows that al-Qaeda and affiliated terrorist groups have long since taken over or co-opted other militants in Syria to fight for them. We must learn from our mistakes in Iraq & Libya and oppose this policy.
90 replies587 retweets985 likes
 
 



While I agree with US House Rep Tulsi Gabbard, it's also true that you can't learn from what you choose to ignore and far too many in the United States have elected to ignore the Iraq War for over eight years now.

Which is how so much is allowed to take place under the radar.


  1.  6 minutes ago
15 years after the invasion of Iraq, and now largely out of the glare of the media, US and UK oil corporations start to flaunt the spoils of imperial conquest.
3 retweets2 likes
 
 



  1.  1 hour ago
Iraq and BP have signed an initial deal to develop Kirkuk oil fields.
3 replies3 retweets11 likes
 
 




The money flows in Iraq.  So does the blood.  XINHUA reports, "Two policemen and a civilian were killed and eight other people injured on Wednesday in bomb and gunfire attacks, mainly targeting security forces, in Iraq's eastern province of Diyala, a provincial official and a security source said."


The violence continues as prime minister Hayder al-Abadi would prefer people to focus on the elections scheduled to take place in May.  But there have been so many problems already with the roll out -- including that Hayder's merger with the militias has already collapsed -- collapsed mere days after being announced.

Mustafa Habib (NIQASH) reports:

 Al-Abadi announced the formation of the “victory alliance” last week and as soon as he did so, another alliance – one comprised of many of the political organisations affiliated with the Shiite Muslim militias that had fought the extremist Islamic State group – joined it. This includes some of the more hard-line and controversial organisations, closely related to Iran, and it is led by Hadi al-Ameri, the head of the Badr organisation.
The formation of this alliance was particularly odd because just a few days beforehand, the two groups involved had appeared to be enemies, exchanging accusations and slurs.
However just as quickly as it formed, that particular partnership disintegrated. But before it did so, it put al-Abadi in the firing line, drawing criticism from voters, fellow politicians and the country’s religious authorities.
Just one short week before the victory alliance was created, analysts had suggested that al-Abadi would stand closer to the cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, and his political party, and that they would be opposed to any political entities formed by the former prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, who has a closer relationship with the Shiite Muslim militias. Basically, it seemed that the former – the anti-Iran, anti-foreign interference parties would stand against the politicians more closely affiliated with Iran, the latter.
But that did not happen and some observers now say that Iran was involved in the deal done between al-Abadi and the Shiite Muslim militias’ parties. Some have even suggested that Iranian military commander, Qasim Soleimani, might have had a hand in the political jockeying. They say that Soleimani would have engineered a reconciliation between the Shiite Muslim militias, which often profess allegiance to Iran, and al-Abadi’s faction. He would have done this in order to ensure, firstly, Shiite unity inside Iraq and secondly, that the prime minister of Iraq was definitely going to be a Shiite Muslim.
But after the announcement of the alliance, things did not go quite as planned. There were three main factors behind the alliance’s speedy collapse.


RUDAW notes:

 With Iraq in an election year, not only are alliances being formed and broken among Iraq's Shiite political leaders in the south, but in the north minority groups like the Shabaks are actively seeking alliances with larger parties.

Ghazwan Dawoodi, the only Shabak member of the 39-person Nineveh Provincial Council, has formed the Shabak Freedom Front and is seeking an alliance with the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) ahead of Iraq’s provincial and parliamentary elections.

"We will run for both Iraqi elections," Dawoodi, who is a lawyer by profession from a village near Bashiqa, told Rudaw English.

The Front was formed on December 30, 2017. Dawoodi, 38, was elected as its leader after a congress attended by about 300 Shabaks in Sheikhan. It is a registered party with the Iraqi government.


Right now, elections are supposed to take place in approximately four months.  Though there is talk that the may be postponed, others insist this will not happen.  MIDDLE EAST MONITOR reports, "The Iraqi Wisdom Movement led by the head of the Shia National Alliance, Ammar Al-Hakim, rejected yesterday demands made by Sunni parties and blocs in the Iraqi parliament to postpone the general elections scheduled for 12 May to next year."


As we've noted for weeks now, Hayder needs elections quickly.  He is hoping to benefit from the claim that he destroyed ISIS.  The longer it takes for elections to be held, the greater the likelihood that events on the ground will dim the luster.


Today, Mina Aldroubi (THE NATIONAL) reports:
Iraqi security officials say that territory in the north could easily be recaptured by ISIL despite Baghdad’s insistence that the extremists have been defeated.
The admission came as a report by Jane's Terrorism and Insurgency Centre said there have been more attacks even though terror deaths have declined.
Although victory was declared against ISIL in December, the group continues as the world’s most active terror organisation by number of attacks, according to research by the London-based centre.
A commander of the paramilitary units known as the Hashed Al Shaabi who fought alongside Iraqi troops in routing the extremists, said the northern city of Nimrud (in Nineveh governorate) could “fall at any time because security there is so fragile.”


Who could have seen that as a possibility?

Oh, wait, we did.  Repeatedly.  Most recently yesterday:

 Hayder's determined to hold onto elections in May even after his coalition splintered yesterday.  Probably because he's trying to run on "I put an end to ISIS."  Even though he didn't and he hasn't.  Even though the Baghdad bombings this week demonstrate the Islamic State continues.

The longer he waits, the more that reality sinks in.

And what if the Islamic State manages to seize another city in June?

He's got to push those elections and get them to take place in May.



Interesting how many comment but have no basis to do so.  Again, on the GRE's I scored in the top 3% on analytical ability, I'm known for my analysis.  (That's why the CIA tried to recruit me in college.  Hmm . . . Will 2018 be the year we name the 'good' professor, admired by so many, who actually did the bidding of the CIA?)


So many paid to do analysis don't know _____.

Take this . . .



  1.  1 hour ago
Just a few months ago, it appeared that the Kurds of Iraq and Syria were the biggest winners in the war against the Islamic State. But instead of witnessing the creation of an independent homeland, they have suffered a major setback.
1 reply19 retweets15 likes
 
 




I read that and marvel at the stupidity.

Apparently, revolutions, insurgencies and rebellions weren't studied by all.

Which, if you think about it, explains the timidity in the leadership of the Democratic Party.  They forever fail by underestimating the American people.

They settle for the weakest and most limited positions while they insist that these are the only successful moves to make.

No.

In loss, there is rally.  In defeat, there is rebirth.

A revolution is not a straight line climbing upwards.

As important to a revolution as the victories are?  The losses.

This is what binds the committed together.  This is what pushes and motivates.

The minor -- and it is minor in the historical sense -- 'setback' that so many see taking place it a huge motivator for the Kurds.

It's also freeing.  They've watched basically every government around the world forsake them.  That's liberating.  They know now that there is no one who will defend them or protect their interests.  Better to have that information going forward than to be repeatedly fooled year after year.

Analysis is not about next week.  It's not a recap or a synopsis of recent events.

Analysis is about the big picture.

It's very sad and telling that a supposed 'think journal' like FOREIGN POLICY can't analyze, they can only repeat what's already taken place.

The following community sites -- plus Jody Watley, BLACK AGENDA REPORT and DISSIDENT VOICE -- updated:


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