Blog Betty (Thomas Friedman is a Great Man was an online novel)

Wednesday, October 07, 2020

Best place I ever visited?

Loved this video analysis from Jimmy Dore.

Leif e-mailed a question. He asked if I could answer what my favorite place to visit in the US was?

I grew up in Atlanta which has a lot of spots I love but I'll leave it out since it's home. I've lived in California for several years now so I'll leave it out as well.

What immediately comes to mind is the Grand Canyon. It just leaves me spellbound. I've been there four times in my life and it's always a treat and a wonder. It's probably also an obvious call.

So I'll note another place I visited that I found amazing: Oregon's Fairy Falls. This is a waterfall. I love it. We hiked there and the greenery around it as amazing as the waterfall itself. To gaze upon it is to feel peace and grasp how uncomplicated our world actually should be.

Now to cover my bases, let me insist that the best place I ever visited is my mother's kitchen! She is an incredible cook. But outside of that :D, my favorite was Fairy Falls.

"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):

Wednesday, October 7, 2020. NEWSWEEK continues its lousy history of 'trend' stories, more trouble in Iraq's KRG, Joe Biden doesn't want to debate, Australia's 60 MINUTES covers Tara Reade's charges, and more.

At NEWSWEEK, Daniel Villarreal offers this useless factoid, "The ongoing coronavirus pandemic has now claimed more American lives than the total number of U.S. soldiers killed during historic conflicts in Vietnam, Korean, Iraq, Afghanistan and World War I."

What the hell is that supposed to tell us?

The Coronavirus is deadlier than war?

You're comparing the numbers for a pandemic in the US (and only in the US, ''American lives") to wars fought on foreign lands. But it's not even that. It's just Americans killed in wars fought on foreign lands.

Soldiers sent into a foreign country will always be a smaller population.

Let's look at war fought on US soil. The estimated death toll for The Civil War -- an underestimate, war death tolls always are -- is 618,222. Have an equal number of US lives been lost in the pandemic thus far?

No.

Even if it had, comparing a war (usually thought out and planned) to a disease is stupid because it produces no insight, no real knowledge, just a useless factoid.

And if you're going to count the dead in a war and not want to look like a xenophobe, you don't count just the US forces. You count forces on all sides, you count civilians, etc. This is nonsense and the sort of garbage that NEWSWEEK has long trafficked in for years -- going back to its earliest stages as a front for the CIA in Europe.

You have to wonder why, after the 2018 office raid and seizure of computers, the rag didn't just shut down then.

In the real world, Jeff Schogol (TASK AND PURPOSE) reports:

The U.S. military has completed its drawdown from about 5,200 to fewer than 3,000 troops in Iraq, said Army Col. Wayne Marotto, a spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition fighting ISIS in Iraq and Syria.

Marine Gen. Kenneth McKenzie Jr., head of U.S. Central Command, first announced on Sept. 9 that the reduction of U.S. forces in Iraq was expected to be completed by the end of the month.

“This reduced footprint allows us to continue advising and assisting our Iraqi partners in rooting out the final remnants of ISIS in Iraq and ensuring its enduring defeat,” McKenzie said during a speech in Iraq. “This decision is due to our confidence in the Iraqi Security Forces’ increased ability to operate independently.”

Even though Marotto told Task & Purpose that the U.S. military had fewer than 3,000 troops in Iraq as of Sept. 30, a Pentagon spokeswoman issued a statement on Tuesday that appeared to indicate the drawdown is ongoing.

In other news out of Iraq, Human Rights Watch has issued the following:

Kurdish authorities have unlawfully closed two offices of a private media outlet, NRT, for over a month, apparently for covering protests and for broadcasts critical of the ruling party, Human Rights Watch said today.

The Kurdish authorities had no court order and only imposed the shutdown in Erbil and Dohuk, the areas controlled by the Kurdistan Democratic Party, raising concerns that the closure is politically motivated.

“If NRT broke the law, surely the authorities would have taken the appropriate measures to take the outlet to court,” said Belkis Wille, senior crisis and conflict researcher at Human Rights Watch. “But party officials have instead chosen to take actions outside of the scope of the law.”

The harassment of NRT and its reporters follows a pattern of regional government attacks on the media. In June, Human Rights Watch published a report on the range of defamation and incitement legal provisions that Baghdad and Kurdish regional authorities have used against critics, including journalists, activists, and other dissenting voices.

On August 11, 2020, Shaswar Abdulwahid Qadir, the leader of the opposition New Generation Movement political party in the Kurdish Region, issued a call on NRT, a private media outlet with TV and radio stations and a website that he owns, for public protests to demand better education, employment opportunities, and anti-corruption measures. On August 12, his call triggered protests across the region that lasted for about a week. NRT, which has both Kurdish and Arabic language channels, was the only outlet to cover the protests in any detail.

On August 19, NRT’s news director, Rebwar Abd al-Rahman, and another employee who was there told Human Rights Watch that the Asayish – the regional government’s security forces – raided their office in Dohuk and held the staff there for several hours, then ordered them to go home, seemingly in response to the protest coverage.

Al-Rahman said the security forces did not present a court order but said that they had instructions from a Kurdistan Democratic Party official to close down the offices. Al-Rahman said the Asayish also closed their Erbil offices on the same day, again without presenting any court documents. The offices have remained shut, though the channel has remained on the air as authorities did not close its headquarters in Sulaymaniyah down. This has meant that reporting teams in Dohuk and Erbil have been unable to report from the field and appear on TV spots.

Dindar Zebari, the regional government’s coordinator for international advocacy, alleged in a statement to Human Rights Watch on August 23 that NRT and Qadir “consistently aimed to exploit the freedom media agencies enjoy in [the KRI] for their own political agenda … they usually resort to provocative propaganda campaigns amid critical circumstances, such as during the war against terrorism and coronavirus outbreak.”

He said the outlet had violated article 2 of Law No. 12 (2010), which he said makes it a crime for a media outlet to encourage “public disturbance and harm social harmony.” The law allows the Youth and Culture Ministry to close the outlet for 72 hours as an initial penalty, then one week if the violation continues, and finally to withdraw the outlet’s license, he said.

Zebari said that in this case the attorney general had called for suspending NRT’s broadcasts for “encouraging citizens to violate the preventative and social-distancing measures issued by the government,” at the request of the ministry. Human Rights Watch was unable to determine which law Zebari was referring to, given that the law he cited relates to the regional government’s Municipalities and Tourism Ministry.

Zebari said the Youth and Culture Ministry had issued several warnings to NRT, most recently on June 3. However, the head of the Youth and Culture Ministry, Shirwan Aula, said on September 8 his ministry had issued no warnings. On September 9, Zebari accused NRT in a Facebook post of “inciting people to protest and rebel against authority … NRT is always violating the laws by provoking protests and public disorder,” and said that the outlet would be charged under the regional government’s Press Law.

One of NRT’s lawyers, who asked to remain anonymous, told Human Rights Watch on September 17 that the authorities had not sent the company any official warnings or summons to court. He said another lawyer had gone to the Erbil courthouse to confirm whether any legal suits were pending against the company but that court authorities said there were none.

Al-Rahman and the lawyer pointed out that NRT’s headquarters in Sulaymaniyah had not been closed down, which they said indicates that the decision to close the Erbil and Dohuk offices was political, as those governorates are controlled by the Kurdistan Democratic Party, while Sulaymaniyah is not. A court-ordered closing would have to apply throughout the region, including in Sulaymaniyah.

The authorities have taken other measures to intimidate NRT’s staff. On August 19, the Asayish arrested an NRT reporter in Zakho under the KRI’s Law for the Organization of Demonstrations (11/2010), which prohibits people from participating in protests for which the organizers have not sought advanced permission from authorities.

They held him for 11 days, then released him on bail and later dropped the charges, acknowledging he had been covering the protests as a journalist, al-Rahman, the news director, said. He said they also confiscated video equipment of two other reporting teams in Akre, one as a team passed through a checkpoint to report on a Turkish airstrike and the other at a checkpoint outside of Amadiya.

While international human rights law allows governments to place restrictions on the media for national security reasons, these restrictions must be prescribed by legislation and be “necessary in a democratic society.” Any limitation must respond to a pressing public need and be compatible with the basic democratic values of pluralism and tolerance. Restrictions must also be proportionate – that is, balanced against the specific need for the restriction.

Restrictions may not be used to suppress or withhold information of legitimate public interest not harmful to national security, or to prosecute journalists for reporting such information. For the government to fulfill this responsibility, journalists should be able to report on all viewpoints, including those which are in conflict with authorities, without fear of arrest.

Authorities should immediately allow NRT to reopen its offices, and refrain from further acts of intimidation.

“The Kurdistan government has no right to silence coverage of protesters and their demands,” Wille said. “And it definitely does not have the right to shut down an entire outlet, illegally, just for covering protests.”

As noted in the September 24th snapshot, Iraq's Kurdish president Barham Salih has a reporter arrested. The Committee To Protect Journalists issued the following on the day Salih addressed the United Nations:

New York, September 23, 2020 – Kurdish authorities in Iraq should immediately release journalist Bahroz Jaafer, drop all charges against him, and allow the press to cover and write critically about politicians without fear of detention or legal action, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Yesterday, police arrested Jaafer, a columnist for the independent news website Peyser Press, in the northeastern Iraqi Kurdish city of Sulaymaniyah and transferred him to the Azmar police station, where he remains in detention, according to news reports and a statement by the Metro Center for Journalists’ Rights and Advocacy, a local press freedom group.

Authorities charged Jaafer with criminal defamation, according to the Metro Center. If tried and convicted under Article 433 of Iraq’s penal code, Jaafer could face up to one year in jail and a fine of up to 100 dinars (about 8 US cents).

The arrest was sparked by a defamation complaint filed by the lawyer of Iraqi President Barham Salih, in response to a column by Jaafer criticizing the president, according to those reports.

“Iraqi authorities should develop a thicker skin and stop resorting to the criminal code to stifle critical reporting and commentary,” said CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa representative, Ignacio Miguel Delgado. “Iraqi President Salih should immediately drop the defamation complaint against journalist Bahroz Jaafer, and local authorities should release him unconditionally.”

On August 29, Jaafer published a column titled “How much longer will the president be driving the wrong side?” in which he criticized Salih, also an ethnic Kurd, for allegedly failing to support Iraqi Kurdistan amid disputes with the national government over land, oil, and the autonomous region’s budget.

Karwan Anwar, head of the Sulaymaniyah branch of the government-funded Kurdistan Journalists’ Syndicate, told local broadcaster Rudaw that Jaafer, a member of the syndicate, is required to remain in detention until a hearing scheduled for September 30, unless he is granted bail beforehand.

The Iraqi president’s media office did not immediately reply to CPJ’s request for comment sent via messaging app. Dindar Zebari, the Kurdish regional government’s coordinator for international advocacy, did not immediately reply to CPJ’s emailed request for comment.

Salih's done nothing to help the Iraqi people -- that includes the Iraqi activists. Sunday we noted the kidnapping of activist Sajjad al-Iraqi.

Turning to the US where a presidential election is weeks away, Democratic Party nominee Joe Biden has declared that there should be no second debate if President Donald Trump, Republican nominee, has COVID.

There's so much wrong with that. For starters, a debate should bring in all candidates who have a statistical chance of winning based on ballot access. That means Jo Joregensen of the Libertarian Party should absolutely be there. Is Joe scared to debate Jo? Yes, he is. Also present should be Howie Hawkins who has the statistical chance of winning.

So there's that.

There's also the issue that Americans have COVID and have had COVID. Is Joe going to spit on them, disrespect them, call for them to be shunned, maybe rounded up and locked up?

I get that it's confusing for Joe Biden, a man who thinks it's appropriate to grab a woman from behind, sniff her hair, touch a little girl's chest were her nipples are, etc.

Donald's a man. Joe may be confused and think that he has to wrap himself around Donald the way he wraps himself around women and girls.

Here's NBC NEWS with a video of some of his inappropriate moments.

Here's CNN's footage.

Here's ABC NEWS reporting on women coming forward.

Here's CBS NEWS interviewing one of the women Joe was inappropriate with.

Here's Samantha Bee's take.

Tara Reade has credibly accused Joe of assault. While 60 MINUTES in the US has ignored the story, 60 MINUTES in Australia covered the news this week.

"Governing," he insisted when trying to defend his inappropriate behavior, "is about contact.'' His words. His choice. He said them in the video response he taped.

Now he wants to call off a debate by claiming otherwise?

When the going gets tough, Joe goes running. He cowardly ran from Vietnam. (Yes, cowardly. He has voted to send others to war and he has postured as though he himself were a veteran so his actions are cowardly.) He ran from Vietnam pretending he had asthma -- asthma that didn't prevent him from being on sports teams in high school or college (football and baseball).

Now the coward wants to run from the debates?

Not very presidential.

At least he has illegal support from foreigners -- I'm referring to the in-kind donations that are the coverage coming out of the UK's GUARDIAN. The most recent garbage is that Joe can carry Texas!!!!

Far from the whoring by the pro-war GUARDIAN, you have former US House Rep and former candidate for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination Beto O'Rourke Tweeting three days ago:

Biden must make Texas a priority. By spending resources here, visiting the state and reaching Latino voters, he can end the national nightmare on election night. We make the case with  @torygavito
 & @WayToWinAF

Perspective | Joe Biden can end the drama on election night. All he has to do is win Texas.

If Democrats put some money into the Lone Star State now, they could close off President Trump’s options.

By the way, THE GUARDIAN bases their story on Dallas County with a nod to McAllen. Dallas County? We have a ton of community members from Dallas County. What would they tell you? I'm on the other phone with Sabina right now (one phone to dictate the snapshot, one to talk to Sabina). She wants you to grasp that this is the part of Texas, her home, where they have elected a Latina sheriff, an openly gay Latina. She states this is not reflective of all of texas and points to Ron Kirk's disaster -- when he ran for the US Senate. Kirk had been the Mayor of Dallas. His run for the Senate was a joke (and East Texas community members pointed out in real time that he didn't even air commercial in East Texas). Dallas is one city -- a majority-minority city. It is not Texas. It is a part of Texas.

Beto knows Texas, his home state, much better than reporters for a foreign outlet. He's stating what needs to be done. And yet THE GUARDIAN's offering puff pieces and fantasy fiction.

The following sites updated:

Not much

Jose Nino (ANTIWAR.COM) notes:

The upcoming month will prove fateful for Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks The journalist will stand trial in the United Kingdom for an extradition request to the United States, where he could face 175 years in prison for violating the Espionage Act and other computer-related crimes.

Assange was accused of aiding Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning in 2010 when Manning provided WikiLeaks with an explosive batch of classified information that implicated the U.S. in various war crimes. Manning would later languish in prison for seven years before the former Army Private First class had her sentence commuted by then-President Barack Obama.

Although the Manning drama has receded, for the time being, the US government continues to work diligently to persecute Assange for doing journalistic work many members of the Fourth Estate refuse to do. Assange was slapped with at least 18 charges by the US Justice Department for illegally acquiring and disclosing classified information that allegedly undermined US national security interests.

For example, some of these leaks included the journalist’s efforts to shine a light on US military behavior that would normally be classified as war crimes, a CIA mass surveillance program (Vault7), and political corruption within the Democratic National Committee, among other legally questionable behavior the so-called Deep States has been involved in.

That's all I've got tonight.

Other than a friend who's got a problem. A jerk moved next to her apartment. He's on the other side of her bedroom wall. Around one in the morning, he starts screaming and yelling the most disgusting things -- yelling them so loud she can hear. Vile threats to kill some woman by mutilation. He carries on until around 3:30 in the morning and it's really bothering her.

He's also a pig. They have 'trash valet' which means their trash in garbage bags is picked up five nights a week. Garbage bags.

He's had boxes out on their shared landing for three nights now. They're not going to pick up boxes and he should have realized that on the first night. But he's got his 37 inch TV box out there, his microwave box and five other boxes she has no idea what they are.

He's loud and threatening and a pig.

"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):

Tuesday, October 6, 2020.

We're having problems with the website so we're doing a workaround. Hopefully, links can be put in as usual later today. In yesterday's snapshot, we were noting the militia issue. An hour or so after the snapshot went up, Hamdi Malik weighed in at The Atlantic Council:

Notwithstanding Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi’s desire to bring all of Iraq’s armed groups under the authority of the state, Iran-backed Shia militias have stepped up their relentless campaign of undermining the state’s sovereignty yet again. This comes despite the fact that they are suffering from a lack of leadership after the United States assassinated Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the most influential commander of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), and Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani, and diminished resources due to the US “maximum pressure” policy on Iran. However, because of these circumstances, Kadhimi has a historic opportunity to reclaim Iraq’s sovereignty. Can he be successful?
Kadhimi’s reaction to the militias’ escalation of tensions
On September 13, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq’s highest Shia authority in Iraq, met with Special Representative of the Secretary-General for the United Nations (UN) Assistance Mission for Iraq, Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, in his humble house in Najaf. During this meeting, Sistani offered a rare expression of support to Kadhimi’s efforts to end pro-Iran militias’ incursion on Iraqi sovereignty. “The current government is required to continue and proceed firmly to… impose the prestige of the state and withdraw unauthorized weapons” said Sistani.
Unsurprisingly, pro-Iran militias disapproved of Sistani’s message. Four days after the meeting, on September 17, they targeted the American Institute for English Language in the middle of the night with an IED, damaging the building. The private language school, located a couple of miles from Sistani’s house, is unaffiliated with the United States. In spite of this, Telegram channels affiliated with pro-Iran militias accused the language school of working for US intelligence services.
Since Kadhimi assumed office in early May, the number of attacks against US interests has increased. Furthermore, British interests and even UN convoys have been targeted; there were some twenty-five attacks on the latter in September alone. Some of the Iran-backed groups behind these acts are not ordinary militias. They go about their activities with a brazen assertion, confident that they are above the law. In late June, Iraq’s Counter Terrorism Service (CTS) arrested fourteen members of Kataib Hezbollah (KH) on suspicion of planning to fire rockets at Baghdad airport and the US embassy. The pro-Iran militia quickly gathered together a force of around 150 heavily armed fighters in nearly thirty pickup trucks and drove to the prime minister’s residence, demanding the release of their comrades who were in custody. Later, all fourteen arrested members of KH were freed and the rocket attacks only increased.
Fearing the worst Baleegh Abu Galal, a member of the Political Bureau of the National Wisdom Movement, an influential Shia political party, stated in an August 16 interview that if Iraq fails to bring unregulated arms under the control of the state, the country will either witness a civil war or foreign military intervention. The main foreign power which might intervene in Iraq is the United States. Abu Galal’s concerns in this regard feel more realistic after reports of the US intention to close its embassy in Baghdad, which will be likely followed by airstrikes on pro-Iran militias. This is what prevents Kadhimi from escalating against the militias. He has, however, began implementing changes among the civilian and military leadership to strengthen the security forces and fight the corruption that is the economic lifeline for rogue militias. Alterations in the military leadership include the selection of Lieutenant General Abdul-Wahab al-Saadi—a widely praised commander who is known for his competence and professionalism—as head of the Counter Terrorism Service (CTS). Changes in the leadership of the Iraqi central bank and other financial organizations target widespread corruption. For years, corrupt officials have used these organizations to enrich themselves along with the political parties and militias they belong to. The new reshuffle aims at cracking down on these activities.

So use the link that's not embedded at this time to continue reading Malik's essay. [Link now embedded]

Iraq is going to have to deal with the militias. Right now, they're a threat to US troops, yes, but they have always been a threat to the Iraqi people. Had the US government been more concerned about the Iraqi people, they would have loudly protested when Hayder al-Abadi made the militias part of the government forces. Now the issue has come back to bite them in the ass. This was a clear danger for the Iraqi people, giving the militias the cover of authority. And this was known early in the war. It's why certain figures were forced to disband their militias if they wanted to run for Parliament. The failures of Barack Obama were many.

And they were totally expected. It's why we advocated -- Ava and I -- to members of the transition team in November or 2008, that Barack announce that he was beginning the withdrawal of all US forces out of Iraq, that he point out that this is the will of the American people as evidenced by their votes in the general election.

If something went wrong, we were told, people would blame Barack. No, we said, if you have him state that this is the will of the American people and they expressed it in their votes, it's not on Barack. All he's doing is carrying out the wishes of the American people who are the true rulers in a democracy.

Well, we were told, he will do the withdrawal he promised (he never did, he instead did what he promised Michael R. Gordon in a little read NYT interview). But that's what it is and it's not going to cause him any problems.

Look it, we said, the temptation will be there to tinker. The foolish thought of this incoming administration will be, "Sure it was a disaster but we are actually intelligent, unlike the Bully Boy Bush administration, and we can pull this off." They can't pull it off and once the tinkering starts? Barack owns the Iraq War as much as Bully Boy Bush. They didn't listen to us.

And they did tinker, almost immediately. They thought they knew best and they didn't. He created an administration of hawks and when they pressed him with idiotic ideas, he didn't have the fortitude to reject the ideas or the intelligence.

What was Barack's big stand in the administration?

Following the 2012 US elections, the day after, thug and then-prime minister of Iraq Nouri al-Maliki called him to congratulate him on his victory. Big strong Barack did what? Flailed his arms at his assistant and whined, "Send it to Joe! Send it to Joe!" He refused to take the call. That was his 'protest' over the secret torture cells and jails that Nouri was running, the way Nouri was persecuting the Sunni people, etc. That's how Barack 'stood up' to a tyrant: "Send it to Joe!"

They lied to the American people and called a drawdown a "withdrawal" -- no one sold that lie more than the whores of MSNBC but really, few had clean hands. In the MSM, the only ones who told the truth were Ted Koppel and THE NEW YORK TIMES' Elisabeth Bumiller. The rest were committed to not wanting to harsh the mellow. So you didn't learn that, as then-Senator Kay Hagen pointed out in an open hearing, the US was really just restationing large numbers of US military members around Iraq -- putting them in Kuwait for example. Or that, of course, not everyone was leaving and that some would remain for 'training purposes.'

Left unstated in the reports of the whorish media was that the Iraqi officials didn't want any US training. The US State Dept was supposed to oversee the training at this point. But then-US House Rep Gary Ackerman would point out to the State Dept's Brooke Darby that the Iraqi government had already made clear that they did not want any help from the US in training their police or military. In fact, classes had already 'started' at that point and the Iraqi were not showing up.

All of this and so much more could have been avoided. But Barack and his team wanted to 'tinker' and all they did was make it worse.

This was especially clear in 2010. In March of that year, the Iraqi people went to the polls to vote. It was very violent at the time and they risked their own safety to vote. The incumbent was Nouri al-Maliki. He attempted to win by, among other things, bribing. Areas without potable water were suddenly gifted, by him, with ice. That's just one example. It was already known that he was a thug. We knew he was paranoid. In fact, his CIA profile stressed the paranoia and that's why Bully Boy Bush made him prime minister in 2006. It was thought that his paranoia could be used to control him.

He was persecuting journalists, Sunnis and rival Shi'ite politicians. Nouri fought against everyone.

The mood in the country was that Nouri needed to be replaced.

You wouldn't know that from western coverage. Despite an incredible accurate analysis by Deborah Amos (then on leave from NPR), NPR, for example, featured Quil Lawrence, right after the election, declaring that Nouri had won. The votes were still being counted.

Nouri did not win. He immediately stamped his feet and screamed -- so much so that the UN tossed him a few more votes but that still didn't allow him to be the winner.

What did he do?

He refused to step down.

Who could have guessed?

No one?

The top US commander in Iraq at the time guessed. Gen Ray Odierno was very concerned that Nouri might lose the election and refuse to step down. But the worst Ambassador the US ever had, Chris Hill, had shut Odierno out of the process and Barack let Chris get away with it. Chris was offended that the western press were quoting Odierno and interviewing him and no one seemed overly interested in Chris -- who did not nap all the time, after all. He took a 'siesta' (his term) in his office daily but he wasn't napping when, for example, he went to a Halloween party. That was disgusting and offensive and he should have been forced to leave the State Dept over that -- he went as a Secret Service Agent accompanying a woman dressed as Jaqueline Kennedy in her outfit from the day of JFK's assassination. That's disgusting and offensive and a member of the State Dept should not be dressed that way -- let alone a US ambassador. How disrespectful.

Nouri dug in his feet for eight months.

Now the US was 'gifting' Iraq with democracy. So a few individuals in Barack's administration insisted that votes count, votes matter. Iraqiya won the election and, therefor, Ayad Allawi, the leader, should be named prime minister-designate and given the chance to form a government.

But they were the few. Joe Biden and others felt that Nouri was there guy. The SOFA would run out and Nouri would give them a renewal. Nouri was there guy. Sure, he murdered people, sure he was a thug, but he was their thug, their murderer.

So instead of demonstrating that every vote counts, that in a democracy, the will of the people is supreme, what happened?

Joe Biden led negotiations on a pact, The Erbil Agreement, between the heads of Iraq's political parties. The Erbil Agreement was formalized pork -- everyone agreeing to let Nouri have a second term was promised something in exchange in writing. The Erbil Agreement overturned the votes of the Iraqi people.

Joe wants to lecture about Donald Trump possibly refusing to step down? Well Nouri did refuse and instead of confronting him, Joe made it possible for Nouri to have a second term.

Nouri's a thug and a liar and he used The Erbil Agreement to grab the second term and then he refused to honor it -- to live up to the promises made to the other political blocs. Why? Through his spokesperson, he declared the US-brokered contract illegal.

The second term saw Nouri go even more out of control.

As he persecuted everyone, ISIS began appearing in Iraq. As he threatened the Sunni protesters who were shutting down the highway out of Baghdad to Anbar, ISIS appeared promising they would protect the Iraqi people. That's how they publicly started in Iraq. Nouri was kidnapping and killing protesters and ISIS arose saying that they were there to defend the Iraqi people.

ISIS came about because of Barack and Joe refusing to stand up for democracy, for the vote, for the Iraqi people.

Iraqiya was a success because it offered a national identity. Imagine if the US government had fostered that instead of thwarting it? Imagine how much further along Iraq might be right now.

Rami G. Khouri (NEW ARAB) reports on another national identity forming among the protesters and their supporters.

They never should have tinkered. They were never as smart as they thought they were and their 'judgments' were made not based on facts but on impulse. Barack owns that war as much as Bully Boy Bush.

By 2014, he was sending US troops back into Iraq publicly (in the fall of 2012, as reported by THE NEW YORK TIMES' Tim Arango, Barack had already begin sending in more special ops). And he was finally ready to do what he should have done four years earlier: force Nouri to step aside.

By that time, of course, ISIS had run across Iraq and had taken control of Mosul. All of that disaster could have been avoided, had Barack and Joe stood up for the Iraqi people in 2010.

It was one mistake after another. And it's why the Iraqi people continue to suffer.

MIDDLE EAST MONITOR reports:

Iraq yesterday pledged to take measures to protect personnel belonging to foreign diplomatic missions in the country.
Satellite station Alsumaria TV quoted the Foreign Ministry as saying in a statement that the US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, had contacted his Iraqi counterpart, Fuad Hussein, “to express his concerns about Washington’s intention to shut its embassy in the capital city of Baghdad.”
During the call, Hussein pointed to his government’s concerns about the US’ warning that it “may lead to results that are neither in the interest of Iraq or the US.”
He stressed that his government has taken a “number of security, political and diplomatic measures to stop the attacks on the Green Zone and the Baghdad airport,” pledging “tangible positive results in the near future.”

That's what they report. Do you see it happening? Mustafa al-Kadhimi became prime minister of the country on May 7th. He promised to protect the protesters. In the last weeks, two more have been kidnapped. The security forces have repeatedly attacked the protesters. But they're going to protet the US embassy personnel?

Interesting because MIDDLE EAST MONITOR also reports that two rockets hit Baghdad's International Airport.

They're not able to stop rocket attacks on the airport but they're going to be able to protect US embassy personnel? They can't protect Iraqi protesters but they'll be able to protect US embassy personnel. It's an interesting claim.

Again, we can't log into the website this morning so this is being sent via e-mail. Links will be fixed once we can log in and you'll also see the sites that had updated.

The following sites updated:

Monday, October 05, 2020

Did your favorite album make the list?

Last time, in "Music," I noted that we worked on a 500 best albums list at THIRD. It's up as is a list noting which artists had multiple albums make the list:

500 Greatest albums of the rock era

Artists with multiple albums on our 500

I hope you like the list. It took forever and then some. I'll give you a sample, this is the last ten albums to make the list -- 490 to 500:

490) Rickie Lee Jones' FLYING COWBOYS

491) Patti Smith's HORSES

492) Wilco's STAR WARS

493) Radiohead's OK COMPUTER

494) The Afghan Whigs' DO THE BEAST

495) Coldplay's A RUSH OF BLOOD TO THE HEAD

496) Cam'ron's PURPLE HAZE

497) Sonny & Cher's LOOK AT US

498) Joan Baez' JOAN

499) Dionne Warwick's THE WINDOWS OF THE WORLD

500) Donovan's FAIRY TALE

The list is varied and includes a lot of great stuff so please check it out.

"Iraq snapshot" (THE COMMON ILLS):

Monday, October 5, 2020. In Iraq another activists has been kidnapped, the protesters are tired of words and the militias are out of control.

Iraq has seen a year of protests as the people refuse to turn a blind eye to the corruption and demand basic services (electricity, potable water) and jobs.

Do you know or do you not know

that victims’ wounds are a mouth?

A mouth unlike that of an impostor

nor like he who implores.

It shouts at the poor and hungry:

shed your blood and you shall be fed.

And yells at the subservient:

humiliate the villains and you shall be honoured.

A poem to honor the protesters. It was written as January wound down in 1948 by Iraqi poet Muhammad Mahdi al-Jawahiri. whose brother Jafar was killed -- along with 300 to 400 other protesters in Baghdad -- January 27, 1948.

The Iraqi people have long suffered and they've long protested. The past year has seen them arrested, secretly arrested, kidnapped, injured, tortured and killed. But that hasn't destroyed them, it hasn't broken their spirit. They have a long history of protest -- generation after generation.

Thursday was the one year anniversary of the start of the protests and Iraqis turned out in record numbers across Iraq to show their support for the movement.

PEOPLE'S DISPATCH notes:

Protesters carried portraits of all the people who were killed or went missing during the protests. They demanded punishment for all those responsible for the killings and freedom and safety to protest.

Last year’s protests forced the government, led by prime minister Adel Abdul Mahdi, to resign. After months of political uncertainty, his successor, Mustafa al-Kadhimi, was appointed in May this year. Kadhimi promised investigation into the deaths of protesters and strong action against corruption. His government also announced early elections for the Iraqi parliament in June next year. The last elections were held in 2018.

Protesters have also been demanding an end to the political quota or muhasasa system in Iraq which is seen as the root cause of nepotism and corruption in the country. The muhasasa guarantees a proportional representation of all major ethnic groups in the country and fixes crucial government posts according to the sects. For instance, as per the Iraqi constitution, the prime minister of the country can only be a Shia, president a Kurd and speaker of the parliament a Sunni. The system was introduced in the country by the America-led occupation administration post the 2003 invasion.

Protesters are also demanding effective measures to end the widespread unemployment among the educated youth in the country. The oil-rich country has also seen a steady rise in poverty in the past few years which has surprised many. Protesters blame successive governments in Iraq for failing to deliver essential services to most of the people as well.

Azhar al-Rubaie (MIDDLE EAST EYE) notes, "On Wednesday night, Iraqis thronged Tahrir Square, the hub of the protest movement in central Baghdad, painted nearby walls with murals of those killed and decorated the area with lights and the country's flag." CGTN offers a video report. RUPTLY also offers a video report (see below).

ALJAZEERA Tweeted the following:

Iraqis in Baghdad mark anti-government protests anniversary https://aje.io/blsz5

2:40 PM · Oct 1, 2020

AFP Tweets:

An #Iraqi woman takes part in a #demonstration in #Baghdad's Tahrir Square on Thursday, on the first anniversary of the start of unprecedented #protests demanding the fall of the country's ruling class #AFP 
 @AFPphoto
 by Ahmad al-Rubaye

6:04 AM · Oct 2, 2020

THE BAGHDAD POST Tweets:

Protesters renew their presence in #Baghdad's #Tahrirsquare, to celebrate the anniversary of October protests against corruption and Iranian influence.

#BaghdadPost #IraqProtests #saveIraqipeople #FreeIraq | #تشرين_الصمود_تعود

11:30 AM · Oct 2, 2020

The poem we quoted at the top was noted by Nabil Salih in his column for ALJAZEERA where he also writes:

On a recent walk to downtown Baghdad, as I crossed Jisr al-Shuhada, I thought of these events of 1948. I looked around and saw that the conditions today are no different than those that sparked al-Wathba Uprising: poverty, negligence, greed, and injustice.

Impoverished elderly were sitting on the sidewalk. Like robots, they stared ahead, extending an empty palm and mumbling pleas for help. Plastic waste littered the banks of the river. Government SUVs with tinted windows lined up the sidewalks, while obese guards snarled at the tuk-tuk drivers who tried to ferry passengers over the one-way bridge for a few banknotes.

In Iraq, some are above the law, others are crushed by its enforcers.

Where is the justice for the protesters who were killed? AL-MONITOR Tweeted:

In a heartbreaking scene, long lines of protesters marched in Baghdad’s Tahrir Square holding photos of more than 600 people who were killed in the last year of protests

Iraq roils as mass protests turn year old

On the anniversary of the start of Iraq's massive protests, Iraqis are preparing for a new wave of demonstrations in Baghdad and other cities.

At GULF NEWS, international editor Omar Shariff notes:

October marks the first anniversary of protests that swept Iraq for months - until COVID-19 cast its shadow - leaving at least 600 people dead and thousands injured. On the surface, a lot has happened; Iraq also got a new Prime Minister. But in reality, little has changed. There continues to be a lack of accountability, despite efforts by PM Mustafa Al Kadhimi to bring the perpetrators of state and quasi-state violence on civilians to justice. Those who are resisting his efforts are the Iran-backed militias. As Iraq tries to recuperate, the biggest obstacle in its path will be these militias. He simply has to find a way of stopping them.

Let's stay with the militias for a minute or two. Samya Kullab's "In Iraq a father faces militia power as he seeks missing son" (AP) reported:

In the span of 30 seconds, Ali Jasb, a young rights lawyer, vanished into the night in southern Iraq.

On an evening a year ago, a woman emerged from a dimly lit street in the city of Amara, her face hidden in a black abaya, and greeted Jasb. Almost immediately a black SUV pulled up, two men forced him in and sped away. The woman climbed into a waiting pickup truck and left.

That last sighting of the 21-year-old Jasb was captured by a surveillance camera at 6:22 p.m. on Oct. 8, 2019. Nothing has been heard from him or his captors.

Ever since, Jasb’s father has been on a search for justice that has run repeatedly against one major obstacle: the increasing helplessness of Iraq’s government in the face of powerful, Iranian-backed Shiite militias.

This result was completely expected by any of us paying attention in real time. That would leave out the likes of THE NEW YORK TIMES which, in 2019, offered that the "militia's independence" would be "chip[ped] away" by this move. They were wrong. The move to bring the militia forces under the umbrella of the Iraqi forces was first proposed by thug Nouri al-Maliki in his second term. But it would be the laughable Hayder al-Abadi who would actually do it. One of the few to call the militia nonsense out in real time was Ranj Alaaldin (Brookings) who observed:

But such beliefs were met with a new reality on Monday, as were (unrealistic) hopes that al-Abadi could rebuild Iraq and bring the country together: His coalition announced that he will join forces with Iran-aligned militias that spear the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), the umbrella Shiite militia organization established in 2014 to fill the vacuum that was left by the collapse of Iraq’s armed forces when ISIS seized Mosul.

Just a day later, the Iran-aligned militias—contesting the elections as the al-Fatih (Conquest) bloc—withdrew from the electoral alliance, not out of principle but because of differences over participation and electoral strategy (there were not enough seats to go around). Indeed, Hadi al-Ameri, the head of the Badr Brigade—Iraq’s most powerful militia, which Iran established in the 1980s and which controls the Interior Ministry—has even hinted they could join forces after the elections to form a government.

Folding the militias into the Iraqi government did not put any controls on the militias. They terrorize the Iraqi people as they did before they were part of the government. They refuse to take orders and they issue threats against the Iraqi government. Last July at The Atlantic Council, C. Anthony Pfaff offered:

The July 6 assassination of Hisham al Hashimi, a well-known political analyst who criticized Iraq’s sectarian politics, represented the loss of someone who made meaningful contributions to Iraq’s recovery and reconciliation efforts. Hashimi’s death also represented an escalation that threatens to bring back the gang-like violence Iraq experienced from 2004 to 2008.

No one has claimed responsibility for Hashimi’s murder. Many suspect Kitaib Hizballah (KH), a militia which is part of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) backed by Iran. Hashimi was critical of KH and they reportedly sent him death threats just prior to his killing. Such murders of course, are not out of character for KH or any of Iran’s proxies in Iraq. They, along with Sunni extremists, were responsible for killing thousands of Iraqis during the years of sectarian conflict. More recently, these militias were responsible for killing, kidnapping, and torturing protesters, who objected, in-part, to Iran’s pervasive and malign influence in Iraq.

In Hashimi’s case, there is additional context that makes KH’s responsibility for his death plausible. Hashimi was supportive of Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Kadhimi, who in June had ordered members of KH detained. It should not be surprising then that many are taking Hashimi’s assassination as a message to Kadhimi: Stop interfering with the militias and their criminal operations.

The difficulty for Kadhimi is that even a strong suspicion of KH culpability is not enough to make further escalation against the militia appear legitimate to the Iraqi people. In fact, KH was not only able to get all their members arrested in the June raid released in 24 hours, they made a public show of welcoming them back publicly as heroes while burning American flags and tramping on images of Kadhimi. Further, it is important to remember that while the case against KH may seem compelling from the outside, it is not so from the inside. Hashimi was an outspoken critic of a range of Iraqi actors and had an extensive list of enemies. Thus, any moves Kadhimi makes against any suspected group without resolving uncertainty regarding their responsibility in a way the Iraqi public will accept will almost certainly escalate the violence.

Having said that, Hashimi’s assassination may provide Kadhimi with an opportunity to act. As the protests have illustrated, Iraqis are unhappy with the militias and Iran’s interference. The prospect of another sectarian war will only make them more unpopular. If Kadhimi does act against the militias, eliminating or constraining one—even one as powerful as KH—will not do much good. As in any other gang-like environment, others will fill the space left behind by the demise of one.

At Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Tamer Badawi argued last month:

Kadhimi came into office with the intention to crackdown on paramilitaries. He has incrementally increased pressure on them using coercion, among other means. However, the targeted paramilitaries lashed back using force, and other staunchly pro-Iran paramilitaries increased their rhetorical attacks on Kadhimi’s government through their affiliated media and television channels. For example, on June 25, the U.S.-trained Iraqi Counter Terrorism Force (ICTS) raided a PMF facility in Baghdad belonging to the 45^th brigade controlled by Kata’ib Hezbollah (KH), a top-tier paramilitary allied with Iran. The ICTS arrested fourteen of the paramilitary’s personnel suspected of involvement in the launching of projectiles at the Green Zone. KH retaliated to the raid by sending forces to lay siege over the main ICTS headquarters and another ICTS facility within the Green Zone.^[2]The vast majority of Kadhimi’s administration believes that KH was responsible for launching rockets prior and during the Iraq-U.S. Strategic Dialogue with the aim of embarrassing him, and of putting pressure on the United States to withdraw troops. To a segment of domestic and international audiences, Kadhimi’s succumb to pressure from KH constituted a major setback.

Prime Minister al-Kadhimi is attempting to counter the paramilitaries on multiple fronts. Financially, he sought to strengthen government control over border crossings to fight corruption and smuggling. Border crossings are used by paramilitaries, including those reportedly active at Diyala’s border crossing into Iran. If the government effectively controls these vital channels, financial inflows from smuggling will decrease in the long term. During a visit, Kadhimi sent the PMF and the Rapid Deployment Forces to take over the two border crossings at Diyala into Iran, according to the Joint Operations Command (JOC). Subsequently, on July 25, the JOC dedicated forces to control fourteen overland and sea port border crossings. Furthermore, to limit the opportunity for corruption, Kadhimi shortened the rotation of border crossing employees from six to three months.^[3] However, unofficial border crossings that are designed to dodge government oversight exist and tend to generate greater revenues for paramilitaries than the official crossings,^[4] but Kadhimi has not previously cracked down on them. In August, the prime minister formed a committee to “investigate corruption and major cases” and assigned the ICTS to execute its orders, in an effort to further curtail the paramilitaries’ income sources.

Mustafa al-Kadhimi appears to 'try' to do many things. Actually achieving anything, thus far, remains beyond his grasp. Mustafa became prime minister May 7th of this year. Yesterday, Louisa Loveluck and Mustafa Salim (WASHINGTON POST) reported on how Mustafa attended a protester's funeral last February and comforted the father . . . with words. All this time later, even after becoming prime minister, words are all Mustafa has had to offer. Little has changed, Omar Shariff (GULF NEWS) observed and he is correct.

The militias are part of the Iraqi forces that have been attacking the protesters. MEMO notes:

Amnesty International yesterday called on the Iraqi government to ensure justice is served for hundreds of protesters who have been killed or forcibly disappeared during the country’s anti-government protests that erupted a year ago.

“The Iraqi government must step up its efforts to deliver justice to the hundreds killed in the course of exercising their right to peaceful assembly. Find the missing, deliver justice for lives lost!” the rights watchdog said on Twitter, adding that last year thousands of protesters in Iraq took to the streets “demanding better living conditions and an end to corruption. Security forces responded with killing protesters, while dozens of activists are still being hunted down and killed to this day.”

The Iraqi authorities’ promises to achieve justice for the victims, Amnesty continued, was “nothing but ink on paper”, as gunmen continue to target activists and demonstrators with impunity.

Earlier yesterday, thousands of protesters gathered in public squares in Baghdad and several other governorates, to commemorate the first anniversary of the popular protests that swept the country for months leaving hundreds dead and thousands injured.

But nothing changes, no improvements come. At the end of last week, Sebastian Usher Tweeted:

Another activist is reported to have been kidnapped in #Iraq   - unknown gunmen reportedly abducted Ahmed al-Hiloo as he arrived back in Najaf after attending demo in Baghdad’s Tahrir Square marking first anniversary of protests

2:07 AM · Oct 2, 2020

Another? A few weeks ago, activist Sajjad al-Iraqi was kidnapped:

The kidnapping of the activist, Sajjad Al-Iraqi, at the entrance to Dhi Qar Governorate.

2:27 PM · Sep 19, 2020

Ruba Ali al-Hassani Tweeted:

The person who kidnapped Sajjad Al-Iraqi has been identified by witnesses as Idris al-Ibeahimi, who is affiliated with Badr militia and was helped by Asa'ib AHL al-Haqq. The people show much greater initiative than the police in investigating abductions. #Iraq #IraqProtests

Words. That's all Mustafa offers, words. And the protesters are getting sick of it. Azhar al-Rubaie (MIDDLE EAST EYE) reports:

Demonstrators on Thursday gave the government until 25 October to meet their demands or face a general strike.

"Kadhimi's government, just [like] the previous one, was granted a lot of time to take action but turned a deaf ear," al-Bawi said.

"We will wait until 25 October, if nothing changes, then protesters from all Iraq's provinces will come to Baghdad to make an open strike and we will call for [a] parliament resolution and formation of an emergency government,"

Kadhimi has called for a general election to be held in June 2021, roughly a year ahead of when it would normally be held, a central demand of the protesters, but Iraq's parliament must still ratify the election date and amend the election law.

The premier, who is struggling to stave off a steep budget deficit and potential economic catastrophe - largely brought about by declining oil prices and fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic - has also indicated he will be tough on militia groups, another key demand of protesters.

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