What the Aftermath of a Violent Revolution Looks Like

“Or Your Lying Eyes…” Truth and Fiction in the News Business by Alexander Cockburn.

Any struggle to overturn established power consists of two phases. The first is the struggle to overthrow that power. In this face, since the established power is strong and established, the only way it can succeed is if all the various opposition groups come together and struggle together. Its a Them aganst Us struggle of everyone trying to work to overturn a strong power that is fighting for its own continued existence.

Then, there's what comes next.

Mr. Cockburn quotes a NYT article as follows ....

“‘Nobody holds back the Misuratans,’ said Jumaa Ageela, an elder there. Bashir Brebesh said the same was true for the militias in Tripoli. On Jan. 19, his 62-year-old father, Omar, a former Libyan diplomat in Paris, was called in for questioning by militiamen from Zintan. The next day, the family found his body at a hospital in Zintan. His nose was broken, as were his ribs. The nails had been pulled from his toes, they said. His skull was fractured, and his body bore signs of burns from cigarettes.

“They’re putting themselves as the policeman, as the judge and as the executioner,’ said Mr. Brebesh, 32, a neurology resident in Canada, who came home after learning of his father’s death. He inhaled deeply. ‘Did they not have enough dignity to just shoot him in the head?’ he asked. ‘It’s so monstrous. Did they enjoy hearing him scream?’

“The government has acknowledged the torture and detentions, but it admits that the police and Justice Ministry are not up to the task of stopping them. On Tuesday, it sent out a text message on cellphones, pleading for the militias to stop.

“‘People are turning up dead in detention at an alarming rate,’ said Peter Bouckaert, the emergencies director at Human Rights Watch, who was compiling evidence in Libya last month. “If this was happening under any Arab dictatorship, there would be an outcry.’”

The one sense I get from history is that it matters how you act during a revolution, and how you achieve your victory in a revolution. If the revolution is a peaceful, non-violent movement for change, then those are the forces that are powerful and respected in the chaotic aftermath of the collapse of the established power. It doesn't guarantee a peaceful and non-violent transition to a stable society in the future. But at least there's a chance it can happen.

On the other hand, if the struggle for change is a violent one, where the most violent and most ruthless of the rebels are the most successful, then these are also the people and groups who are most powerful and if not respected at least feared during the aftermath. And, since they are the ones setting the tune, the chances of a peaceful and non-violent transition to a stable society in the future are pretty much zilch.

On one hand, to achieve real change, what's needed is a mass movement of all opposition groups. But at the same time, it matters how a struggle is conducted, and what examples are set during the struggle. If the day that's remembered is the day that the people came together as a mass and who through their non-violent resistance overthrew a tyrant, then that's what's remembered in the future. That will become the legend.

On the other hand, if the day that's remembered is the day when people with guns fought with the forces of the tyrant, eventually succeeding and overthrowing him/her, then that's what will be remembered. It will be the heroes of that fight, often the most violent, callous and ruthless people, who become the heroes of the new state.. Which means they, and their violence, will likely be calling the tunes in how the new society is created.

Of course, the tyrant also has a say in this. A tyrant like Quaddafy who fights violently and brutally to stay in power, and who fights down to the last breath of the last fool that supports him, tends to force a final violent fight for power in their society, and thus create the sort of aftermath where the most violent and ruthless people who could fight to overthrow him become the creators of the next thing to happen there.

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Vegas Odds

Want a real poll to tell you what's up in the Presidential elections. One that isn't spun by some media conglomorate or defense contractor or political party or campaign that isn't exactly neutral in the fight? Well, check the Vegas Odds.

Obama ------- 5/9
Romney ------ 17/10
Santorum ---- 15/1
Gingrich ---- 30/1
Paul -------- 50/1

Now, just to be clear, that's what the bookmakers have to put out in order for them to get a spread of money across the choices. But, in that sense, its an honest read on how the American people, or at least those willing to place a bet in Vegas, feel about the Presidential race. The Vegas bookies have to offer about 3.5 times better pay-outs to get people to wager on Romney instead of on Obama. Obama is still the clear favorite to be re-elected.

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Government of the Rich, By the Rich, and For the Rich.

Of the rich, by the rich, for the rich by SocialistWorker.org

As usual with the socialists, they are outstanding when it comes to identifying the problems we have in our society. But then, when it comes to what to do about it, they are dead wrong.

CALL IT the 1 percent election.

They may feign interest in the lives of ordinary people in their drive to win votes--visiting small-town diners and hobnobbing with the "common man"--but the leading contenders for the Republican nomination rake in enough money every year to rank at the very top of the U.S. income ladder.

And it's not just the Republicans--top Democrats, including Barack Obama, may talk more often about economic fairness, but they certainly don't deny themselves the kind of wealth that the vast majority of Americans won't see in a lifetime.

That's because from top to bottom, both parties in Washington are committed to protecting the wealth and power of America's elite few. And why not? The vast majority of them are a part of it.

Very, very true. A majority of the people in DC are millionaires. So, is it any wonder that they all got together and compromise on issues like extending the Dubya/Obama tax cuts for the rich, or for constantly lowering capital gains taxes, or that in general its the working people of this country that have to pay all the bills.

This provides a stark lesson about capitalism: An entire class of people does no actual work, but still makes fortunes--and it can buy an entire political class to protect and expand its wealth at the expense of workers and the poor.

That's exactly the system we have today. We have a class of people who do zero real work. They don't really have a job, except managing their 'investments' and spending their money. But we have a political system that is so tilted towards money that they dominate it. And of course, its tilted towards money and their domination because they made it that way.

However, this article falls apart on two counts. First is that it completely ignores the Ron Paul campaign. A very typical thing on the left these days, as his campaign isn't very useful for this sort of propaganda. Its the pin that punctures their balloon.

And, the conclusion it makes is that elections don't matter and that no one should bother with elections, and that instead the way to change the world is to go camp in a city park. Wrong!

Abandoning elections just leaves the rich and powerful even more firmly in power. Once they the rich and powerful win the elections that the left seems to want to abandon, they then use their authority as Mayor or Governor to send in the police to break up the campground in the city park. So, while the left will then churn out even more propaganda about how awful this is, they tend to forget or ignore the point that the reason these people were in charge of the police was because the left ran around telling everyone that elections don't matter.

Elections do matter. And there's a very simple path forward through elections. Teach voters that not only do elections matter, but the easy rule to follow for change is simply to stop voting for rich people. And not to vote for the candidates who have lots of the money of rich people backing them. STOP ELECTING THESE PEOPLE. That's the answer.

There's other names on the ballot. Heck, to even create this propaganda piece the socialists had to ignore the Paul campaigns presence on the ballot. Everywhere I've lived, there's usually at least one name on the ballot of someone who isn't rich and who doesn't have millions of rich people's money behind them. Try voting for these people for a change.

In electing Obama, the voters picked a millionaire who was backed by huge amounts of Wall Street and corporate money. In 2008, the money had shifted so completely to Obama that the McCain campaign declared that they'd accept public financing because they weren't able to raise money. The most bizarre political sight I've ever seen was the left, and especially the unions, working so hard to elected a millionaire backed by corporate millions. What a surprise that this didn't bring change. I'm shocked.

Try not voting for rich people sometime. Try voting for people who live in your neighborhood. Or who work the same jobs as you do. If they aren't on the ballot, help put one there. Elections do matter. And elections can be a powerful tool for change in this country. People just need to learn how to use them.

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Orwell's Obama

Obama's Drift Toward War With Iran by David Bromwich

This article is an interesting mix of Democratic propaganda and bs about Obama and a nice analysis of the real situation with Iran. And, in many ways that illustrates the confusion that infects the Democratic left. The problem is that they still have this inherent belief that Obama is the great progressive saint that was the campaign image of the 2008 primaries.

That leads to long discussions about Obama's supposed flaws, of the sort that occupies much of this article. Obama's slow to act, and never jumps ahead of his opponents. Obama has personal flaws that make him less effective as a President.

The president has made no comment on the situation. He has let it heat up for three years now, while the public mind grows swollen with false facts, and while negotiations, to the extent that there are negotiations, proceed under cover and in secret. As if negotiation were a shameful thing. Time does not tell for Obama. He will always have time. That was his philosophy in drawing out the health care debate for twelve months as his popularity sank from 70% to 45%. It was his policy once again, in catastrophically misjudging the odds for an agreement on the debt ceiling. In that affair, Obama hung back. He left it all in the hands of William Daley before sacking Daley and heading out on the campaign trail.

Yet, all of this seems to stem from an inherent mis-understanding about who Obama is politically. Obama is wall street money. Obama is the Israeli lobby. Obama is the pro-war President who during the last general election campaign supported Dubya's drone strikes inside Pakistan, called Afghanistan the right war, and that all along promised an expansion of the Army, the Marines and the Special Forces, as well as of the alphabet soup of competing intelligence agencies. And what the Democratic Left is incapable of understanding is that the real goals of Obama's policy towards Iran are being achieved by what the Democratic Left calls Obama's flaws.

The article does an excellent job of pointing out the real actions that Obama has taken, such as putting a very pro-Israli operative in charge of his policy. Then Obama sits back and says little publicly.

The way to regime change in Iran (so the strategy dictates) must pass through the destruction of the Iranian economy and a mixture of violence and menace to provoke the Iranian government. The Likud and neoconservative hope is simply to reach a point (if possible, before November) where Iran hits out first against the powers that are choking its trade, undermining its industry, assassinating its citizens and serving up serial ultimatums.

Those who read enough history to know the steps America took against Japan in the year or so before Pearl Harbor will find that a very depressingly familiar scenario.

The problem the Democratic Left has is that they fail to fully understand and appreciate the real Obama. They fail to see that Obama was always the candidate of wall street money, vetted and approved by the various 'defense' industries, and also the candidate of the Israeli lobby.
Obama was the candidate who before the 2008 elections supported Dubya's drone strikes into Pakistan, called Afghanistan the 'right war', and promised to spend what money America would have in a collapsing economy on a bigger Army, Marine Corp and Special Forces and increasing defense budgets. This is precisely the electoral coalition that was the backbone of the Obama campaign.

Yet, the Democratic left seem to have an amazing ability to see that Obama. Instead, they head off into tortured descriptions of Obama's personality flaws. Since they still believe the primary campaign image of Obama as a progressive saint, they can't just accept that maybe Obama is actually a rather skilled craftsman who manages to achieve the policies that his backers desire while convincing the Democratic Left that he really wants the opposite to occur.

The Democrats now have their own versions of Orwell's famous contradictions from 1984. Obama is the President who put Wall Street in complete command of the economy by naming their people as the leading economic advisers, but he's still somehow the progressive who's on our side. Obama is the guy who took millions from big health care corporations and then passed a 'reform' bill that made them even richer at our expense, but who is portrayed as a health care reformer. Obama is the guy who's continued the path of Dubya's wars and started many other new wars, but he's still somehow the anti-war President.

Wall Street = Prosperity
Big Corporate Profits = Health
War still equals Peace.

So, thus you hear all the excuses from the Dems about bad tactics and how Obama's personality doesn't let him do what the mythical Obama supposedly wants. Unfortunately, the reality is that Obama is the guy who took millions from all of Dubya's backers in 2008 and who has realiably executed the policies they wanted all along. The reality is that as always the President and his team are some of the best political operatives in the country, and to constantly assume that they are inept and incapable of doing their jobs is to miss the fact that they do their jobs very well in service of the people who paid for the campaigns that put these people in the White House.

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27 of Kucinich's 35 Article of Impeachment Against Dubya Apply to Obama Too.

27 of 35 Bush Articles of Impeachment Apply to Obama
Posted on February 2, 2012 by WashingtonsBlog

Announcing the Intent to Violate Laws with Signing Statements, Creating Secret Laws, Illegal Detention: Detaining Indefinitely And Without Charge Persons Both U.S. Citizens and Foreign Captives, Violation of the Posse Comitatus Act, etc. Its too long a list to retype. Aren't you glad you voted for change and hope? Next time, try voting against the money and power that wants these policies instead.

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One Million Dead Human Beings.

Just say that to yourself a few times. One Million Dead Human Beings. One Million Dead Human Beings. One Million Dead Human Beings.

And, this wasn't because of some natural disaster. It wasn't because of a drought or a flood. This was the deliberate act of one set of human beings taking actions they knew would cause massive amounts of pain and suffering and death to other human beings.

What do you think of that? Is that something you support? Or, do you consisder that to be something horrible that you'd oppose as a righteous and moral human being?

I'm talking about the United States' invasion and occupation of Iraq.

One million dead by Danny Lucia.

OVER A million Iraqis are dead from America's war.

That sentence is a cognitive litmus test. Some people's immediate reaction is, "That can't be right," because the United States couldn't do that. Or because crimes on that scale don't still happen. Or because they do happen, but only in horrible places that the United States hasn't rescued.

One million is a "Grandpa, what did you do to stop it?" number. It's a number that undeniably puts the American state among history's villains. Those who are not willing or able to accept this are physically unable to retain the fact that over a million Iraqis are dead. Their brains expel it like a foreign germ.

By the way, that one million number is both an understatement and rather dated by now. The real number is most certainly more. The study that number came from actually said about one and a quarter million dead Iraqis. And, its from 2007, so it doesn't even include the last two years of Dubya's killings in Iraq, and none at all of Saint Obama's dead people.

And, even back when the Democrats used to pretend to be shocked, shocked I say, at the dead bodies piling up in what they termed Dubya's Wars, it was always worth remember that Bill Clinton had killed probably as many Iraqis with his sanctions policies. The most famous spine chilling number of that era had some 500,000 extra deaths in Iraq, and that number was only for pre-school-age children back when the Clinton Democrats were working so hard to keep food and medicine out of Iraq. Surely that's only a piece of the deaths that results from such a medieval policy. If the children are dying, no one knows how many others of the ill or infirm or elderly were dying at the same time. A medieval siege always kills off the weakest members of a society, and pre-school-age children are only one aspect of that.

So, could you say Two Million Dead Human Beings? Two Million Dead Human Beings. Two Million Dead Human Beings. Two Million Dead Human Beings.

And that's two million dead human beings that are the direct result of America's policies towards Iraq over the last two decades. Is this something you support?

If you are an American reading this, the answer is almost certainly yes. A vast and huge majority of American voters have been voting for politicians who support and implement this policy. The policies span Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barrack Obama, and its only a tiny fraction of a percentage point or two of Americans who haven't voted for one of those three. And, the policies have been steadily supported by huge majorities in Congress, with the seeming opposition fading away and shifting sides of the aisle as the occupant of the White House changes. In general, the members of Congress elected by Americans are typically either supportive of their party when in control of the mass murder, and then even more shrill and bloodthirsty when in the opposition when they typically decry the current Administration's inefficiencies and mistakes that result in not enough dead human beings.

Two million dead human beings. And that's just in Iraq. It doesn't include the deaths in Afghanistan, which started with the US blockading food supplies to a country dependent on relief aid at the beginnings of the Afghan winter. That was back just after 9-11, and at the same time we were bombing Red Cross/Red Crescent food warehouses inside Afghanistan.

And, it doesn't count Iran, which is now the target of the Democratic and Republican unity in imposing yet more sanctions upon yet more people. With the full support of the Democrats, and with cries from the Republicans that starving people to death is too slow a way to commit mass murder and that we need to start bombing immediately to get our kill rates up to acceptable levels.

Two million dead human beings.

At what point do we become monsters? Do we have to kill more people than Hitler to be consider as big of a mass murdering monster? Does three million get us an honorable mention in the club of mass murdering tyrants? Maybe a portrait on the wall next to Stalin and Hitler and Mao and the other mass murderers of the 20th century? Maybe a little smaller and a little less prominent to reflect the fact that we haven't killed quite so many people, but still an honorable mention in the mass murderer wall of fame?

Its an election year. If you don't like this, vote for someone different. There are almost always other choices on the ballot. Other choices that would oppose this policy of mass death and destruction. There were at least three such candidates on the 2008 Presidential ballot (Barr, McKinney and Nader) as well as two more on the primary ballots (Kucinich and Paul). In 2012, there is Ron Paul running strongly in the Republican primaries, and several independent candidates gearing up for Presidential runs. All of whom would oppose and change this policy of worldwide mass murder. In the last Presidential election, the three anti-war, anti-empire opposition candidates got somewhat less than 3% of the total vote.

If you don't like knowing that you are responsible for electing politicians who are competing with Hitler and Stalin and Mao on the mass murderer wall of shame, then vote for someone different this time.

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More on Obama's Plan for $5 Gas

No Exit in the Persian Gulf?
by Michael T. Klare and Tom Engelhardt, February 01, 2012

Oil and energy expert Michael Klare on the Persian Gulf and where Obama's policies are likely to lead.

No one knows just how high oil prices would go under such circumstances, but many energy analysts believe that the price of a barrel might immediately leap by $50 or more. “You would get an international reaction that would not only be high, but irrationally high,” says Lawrence J. Goldstein, a director of the Energy Policy Research Foundation. Even though military experts assume the U.S. will use its overwhelming might to clear the strait of Iranian mines and obstructions in a few days or weeks, the chaos to follow in the region might not end quickly, keeping oil prices elevated for a long time. Indeed, some analysts fear that oil prices, already hovering around $100 per barrel, would quickly double to more than $200, erasing any prospect of economic recovery in the United States and Western Europe, and possibly plunging the planet into a renewed Great Recession.

So, let summarize. There's a country on the other side of the world, about which there are constant claims that the country has a nuclear program. But, just like with Iraq's famous WMD's that were used as an excuse to start another war, there's absolutely no proof that this fictional nuclear program exists. But, nonetheless, Obama seems to be following a course of action that seems destined to crash the US economy and make the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression much, much worse than what it already is.

In American politics, items like war and sanctions with Iran over yet another fictional WMD program is presented as completely unconnected to the question of whether Americans should be able to find decent jobs. And, if the economy does crash, the politicians quickly try to pretend that the crash is due to some unknown invisible hand in the market and business cycles, and not from their own political actions and the favors they do for their contributors.

Yet, we've seen a trend through Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush, and now Obama that the government consistently takes actions that help their big contributors, but which hurt ordinary Americans and the economy overall. Banks are given unlimited room to run wild and to create new scheme after new scheme to transfer huge amounts of wealth from ordinary Americans to their pockets. Taxes stay ridiculously high to pay for a military that costs more than what the rest of the world combines spends on 'defense' against us. And now, Obama's policies over a fictional WMD program seem destined to cause the price of oil, and of course the price of gasoline to spike mile high as the speculative and unregulated god of markets reacts to America's sanctions and potential war against Iran.

A spike in the price of oil will not only hit your pocket book by raising the price you pay for gas. But, it will make everything cost more, as prices will rise across the board as every company that transports anything in this age of logistics where nothing is made in America anymore raises their prices to account for their higher transportation costs. Everything you buy, and every service you use will add new 'gasoline' or 'energy' fees to their prices.

When it comes to economic policy and the refusal to provide any assistance or stimulus money to ordinary Americans, we've been constantly told that the big danger is 'inflation', yet now we have a foreign policy where the threat of a fictional nuclear weapons program is worth sparking massive inflation in the US economy. And remember, even if Iran did suddenly have a nuclear weapon, they have no way to use that weapon to attack America. They don't have B-2 bombers that can fly around the world, especially not in the face of the US Air Force. Iran doesn't have ICBM missiles to use to launch a nuclear attack. If they do build a bomb,about all the Iranians could do is to put it on display and say 'see, we have one'.

Yet, President Obama is more than willing to crash the economy and possibly cost you your job and your home and your livelihood over this nuclear weapons program that no inspector can find and that couldn't be used to hurt you anyways.

The one thing that is certain is that these people are not on your side.

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Obama Wants $5 a Gallon Gas.

IMF: halt in Iran oil could push crude up 30 pct

Yes, the forecasters and analysts at the IMF, not exactly the home of peaceniks, is predicting as much as a 30% rise in the price of crude oil due to the sanctions on Iran and the threat of war that such an act implies. Don't forget that it was the same sort of sanctions on Japan in 1941 that put Japan's leaders into the frame of mind that war with America was inevitable. This of course was followed by the attacks on Pearl Harbor, the Phillipines and other American colonial possessions in the Pacific.

The International Monetary Fund warned on Wednesday that global crude prices could rise as much as 30 percent if Iran halts oil exports as a result of U.S. and European Union sanctions.

If Iran halts exports to countries without offsets from other sources it would likely trigger an "initial" oil price jump of 20 to 30 percent, or about $20 to $30 a barrel, the IMF said in its first public comment on a possible Iranian oil supply disruption.

Now, anyone who's watched an oil company in operation knows what is going to happen to gasoline prices. If crude oil jumps by 30%, you can expect gasoline prices to increase by at least that much and if not more. Then, they'll stay high after crude oil returns to normal, and even then won't ever drop back down to the pre-jump levels. Once the oil companies get people used to paying $3 a gallon, the price doesn't ever fall below that again.

So, expect at least a 30% rise in gasoline prices, which where I live will push 'regular' up to around $4 and the more premium levels up even higher. And, that's if the oil companies only raise the price by the same percentage as the price of crude oil on the spot market changes. Of course, the great humanitarians at the world's oil companies wouldn't dream of using the crisis as an excuse to raise prices even higher, would they?

This is the direct result of Obama's policies towards Iran. Obama's government has been playing up the fictional Iranian nuclear program and pushing these sanctions upon the rest of the world. This despite the predictable outcomes of such a confrontation and embargo jacking the price of oil higher.

Get ready for the economy to get even rougher. The price of gas is going to rise. Which means that not only will it cost more for you to get around, but everything you buy will have increased prices and more 'gasoline fees' that won't ever go away once put into place. Meanwhile, Obama's Wall Street banker-buddies are crashing the European economy in order to inact harse 'austerity measures' there.

This double whammy of a second banking crisis and skyrocketing energy costs is going to put an end to Obama's fictional, jobless, moneyless recovery and send things tumbling back into a downward spiral.

And, when this happens, remember that its entirely because Obama and his Democratic party loyalists put you and the economy at a lower priority than helping their banking buddies strangle Europe and than starting yet another war, this time with Iran.

Your life sucks and the economy is hard because Obama, the Democrats and most of the other politicians in Washington simply don't give a damn. Obama is capable of yakking away about economic recovery before Congress while at the same time taking actions that will crash the economy. If you learn the lesson that actions speak louder than words, then you'll better understand what's going on

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Where does the money go?

When you are thinking of the trillions of dollars the US government collects in taxes, and then when you are wondering why you can't find a job and you keep driving by storefronts with "For Lease" signs out front, just remember where the money went.

US to Grant Extension of $3.8 Billion in Loan Guarantees to Israel

The Obama administration told Israeli officials this week that the U.S. plans to extend for three years $3.8 billion in loan guarantees to Israel.

and ...

The loan guarantees are in addition to the unmatched support Washington gives to Israel – over $13 billion in direct aid since 2007 and more than $3 billion more scheduled for fiscal year 2012, not to mention privileged deals in military training and equipment.

...

“We consider the loan guarantees as preparation for a rainy day,” a senior Israeli Foreign Ministryofficial said. “This is a safety net for war, natural disaster and economic crisis, which allows Israel to maintain economic stability in unstable surroundings.”

Gee, wouldn't it be nice to have a safety net for a rainy day? Wouldn't it be nice to have the US government spending billions to maintain your economic stability in unstable surroundings? Maybe a Federal loan guarantee for your mortgage would be a nice thing? If you think so, then vote for someone who will put America and the interests of Americans first in the next elections. Supporting Ron Paul in the Republican primaries coming to your state soon is an opportunity to do just that.

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TSA Critic Detained at Airport

Rand Paul’s Pat-Down Standoff With TSA in Nashville Ends

Sen. Paul, who's been a critic of TSA proceedures and pat down searches, was detained at the Nashville airport by TSA officials.

The Twitter account associated with Paul staffer Moira Bagley, @moirabagley, tweeted around 10 a.m., ET, “Just got a call from @senrandpaul. He’s currently being detained by TSA in Nashville.”

Paul’s office confirmed he set off an airport security full-body scanner “on a glitch,” according to a spokesman.
The Paul staffer said TSA agents would not let Paul walk back through the body scanner and were demanding a full body pat-down.

Obviously, the Senator is as a dangerous terrorist who must be closely searched before being allowed to be on an airplane. If you think I'm joking, remember that Homeland Security helped Missouri put out an advisory to their police that anyone with a bumper sticker supporting his father, Rep. Ron Paul, for President was obviously a terrorist suspect.

If nothing else, this just goes to show that the TSA officials at airports have too much power that is unsupervised and impossible to appeal. Millions of Americans are constantly put in the position of having no choice but to abide by whatever arbitrary decisions that are made by TSA officials.

My problem is that I'm old enough to have been taught about America back when there was a Soviet Union. As a child, we were told that one of the reasons the Soviet Union was dangerous and awful compared to free America was that people in the Soviet Union weren't free to travel without having to constantly stop and show their papers and prove their right to travel to government officials at checkpoints.

This even made it into the pre-9/11 movie classic "Hunt for Red October"

Capt. Vasili Borodin: I will live in Montana. And I will marry a round American woman and raise rabbits, and she will cook them for me. And I will have a pickup truck... maybe even a "recreational vehicle." And drive from state to state. Do they let you do that?
Captain Ramius: I suppose.
Capt. Vasili Borodin: No papers?
Captain Ramius: No papers, state to state.
Capt. Vasili Borodin: Well then, in winter I will live in... Arizona. Actually, I think I will need two wives.
Captain Ramius: Oh, at least.

Capt Borodin would be very disappointed in today's America, but he'd surely recognize the arbitrary officials at checkpoints demanding your papers and obedience.

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DHS and Politics

Behind Homeland Security's monitoring of web sites from Undernews

So, why is the DHS, the Department of Homeland Security, the agency with broad scope and the disturbing name that echos of 1930's Germany, monitoring articles and comments on websites ranging from the New York Times to the Huffington Post? Your tax dollars at work,

And, doing more than monitoring "capture public reaction to major government proposals", they are also likely acting to shape and deflect political action by citizens. This is from key Obama advisor Cass Susskind

Government agents (and their allies) might enter chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups and attempt to undermine percolating conspiracy theories by raising doubts about their factual premises, causal logic or implications for political action.

Ever notice how on some comment boards or chat rooms its almost impossible to do any effective organizing, or even to carry on an intelligent discussion. There are almost always people there who are a) trying to tell everyone the story is wrong, b) telling everyone that nothing can be done to change things, or c) generally disrupting the conversation completely with silly, irrelevant posts and supposed flame wars between two such posters of silly posts.

When you see that, it isn't an accident. Now we know, thanks to EPIC's FOIA request that the DHS is monitoring and participating in these websites, including the comment areas. We also know that various PR firms offer the same as a paid service to their corporate clients.

The end result is that a political article that should be a spark to political organizing almost never is. I used to see this sort of organizing done back when the internet was new. Not only would you get an email detailing a problem, but people would be starting to organize to do something about it. These days, you see the same sort of article online, but the comments below almost never have any serious organizing going on. If you see anyone trying to start, watch how quickly the 'trolls' jump in and usually start either screaming at the organizers, or often just screaming at each other to take away the space that would otherwise be available for a free citizenry in a democracy to comment, communicate and organize.

We now see this in several areas of public debate. The government actively telling the citizens what to think and what course should be taken, as well as steps to disrupt any activity and speech to the contrary. This is most obvious on the question of drug policy, where any alternatives to the current prohibition is almost unspeakable in the public sphere. The government and Wall Street's media arm both immediately attack and blast anyone who dares to speak of ending prohibition, and thus scaling back the huge prison-industrial complex that rests upon that policy. Its almost as bad when it comes to the wars. Again, the government and the media have both tended to gang up on anyone questioning whether spending billions to kill sheepherders in Afghanistan really enhances the security of Americans in any real way.

Now it appears that we'll see more and more of this, as the government not only monitors but participates in the online discussions of our supposedly free society. Whenever you look at a string of comments on the internet and see a confusing mess that isn't really a discussion, remember that DHS is probably monitoring and participating in that website. And if not DHS, then a variety of PR firms and security companies that offer the same service.

How to get around this? Spot like-minded people on the internet, and then try to find a way to talk directly to them. Swap email addresses. Remember that you can create closed memberships on websites and forums to keep the trolls out. And, remember that email itself was the first mass-communication tool on the internet. An email list where the trolls aren't allowed to post is still an effective tool.

OK, Back to the SOPA/PIPA blackout. Sorry to interrupt, but I thought an article about government monitoring and interference in the internet was relevant enough to put out even on blackout day.

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SOPA - Internet Blackout

If I had an easy way to black out this blog today, I'd join the 7,000 other websites that are going black today in protest of the proposed Internet censorship bills known as SOPA and PIPA currently in the Congress.

The good news is that massed public opposition seems to be at least slowing down and temporarily preventing these awful bills from going forward.

What a stretch. First we've seen Congress say that having the military can indefinitely detain anyone they want just by pointing at them and saying "terrorist". Now we've got Congress proposing broad powers to censor the internet, joining such other bastions of freedom such as China in the desire to control what people see and hear. I truly do get the feeling that now I know what it must have been like to have lived in Germany in the early 1930's.

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The Lieberman Manuever

In 2006, a leftist rebellion during the Connecticut Senatorial primaries defeated Joe Lieberman and instead nominated Ned Lamont to be the Democratic nominee for US Senate. However, today Joe Lieberman is still the Senator from Connecticut. This is because he immediately ran as an "independent". The Republicans basically abandoned their own candidate, and threw their support behind Lieberman, joining the pro-war, pro-Wall Street Democrats who backed Lieberman.

If Ron Paul wins the Republican nomination for President, expect to see something similar. The pro-war, pro-Wall Street faction of the Republican party will likely throw their support to some prominent Republican who suddenly decides to run as an "Independent". I'd doubt they'd support the pro-war, pro-Wall Street Obama campaign, despite the obvious alignment of interests. But, they wouldn't mind running an 'Independent' campaign that would take Republican votes away from a Republican Paul for President campaign. Even the end result of that was four more years of Obama. The Republicans would still get a Republican president who's following Reagan's economic policies and Dubya's foreign policy, and the tactical advantage of four more years of playing the outsider pretending to oppose Obama's policies.

No matter. The opposition forces in this country would still have a major candidate in a campaign for President. Wall Street's media arm will of course present Mr. Paul as dangerous and will undoubtedly give the Wall Street "Independent" campaign a huge amount of free publicity. But still, a Paul Republican campaign for President would have an opportunity to talk to the people of this country about the assault on the Constitution and the Bill of Rights that has been going on in this country especially since 9-11. It would be hard to impossible to ban the Republican nominee from the debates. And while the Paul's campaign exposure to major media would be diminished by a general hostile tone and a relative lack of money (compared to the Wall Street financed campaigns), it would still have a presence that campaigns like Nader for President never reached.

America has an opportunity before it. There's a major candidate running in the primaries who's finished 3rd and 2nd in the early Iowa and New Hampshire primaries. This is an opportunity. And its an opportunity that the left especially needs to seize. Ron Paul may not be the ideal candidate for a leftist to support, but he's honest and he'd work to restore the Constitution. And among other things, that would undoubtedly include stopping FBI and other federal infiltration of leftist groups, the use of Homeland Security and the FBI against domestic US protesters like the Occupy movement, and the end of harassing legal cases like the grand jury attacks on mid-western anti-war protesters.

There is currently a massive propaganda out from Wall Street and their political parties to tell the left that Ron Paul is dangerous and can't be supported. Pay attention to this when you see it. It tells you two things. One is you learn who out there pushes out the Wall Street line. The other is that you learn to go the opposite direction. If there is suddenly a lot of voices in the left-wing echo chamber telling you that Ron Paul is dangerous, then the best thing to do is to ask why.

And, then maybe, you might remember which of those voices also told you that electing the pro-war and pro-Wall Street candidate Obama. How'd that work out? At some point, when do people learn to do the OPPOSITE of what these voices are telling you. Or to at least check it out. Go out on the internet, and find some LONG, unedited videos of Ron Paul speaking. That's the best way to learn about a candidate. Listen to them in length. Not in the easily manipulated sound-bites that you get from Wall Street's media, but let them speak to you ... and then you decide what you think.

And ask yourself this. Can we really afford four more years of war? Can we really afford four more years of assaults on privacy and civil liberties? Can we really afford four more years of turning the economy and the justice system entirely over to Wall Street?

A Ron Paul Presidency might not create a leftist wonderland, but it would be an important victory for all opposition forces in America, left or right. Wouldn't it be easier to be a leftist activist in America if the FBI was under the control of an honest President who believes strongly in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. So, why does everyone want to try so very, very hard to keep you from supporting Mr. Paul?

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10 reasons the U.S. is no longer the land of the free

10 reasons the U.S. is no longer the land of the free by Jonathan Turley, a professor of law at George Washington University.

• Assassination of U.S. citizens (in company with Nigeria, Iran and Syria)
  
• Indefinite Detention (in company with China and Cambodia)
  
• Arbitrary Justice (in company with China and Egypt)
  
• Warrantless Searches (in company with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan)
  
• Secret Evidence
  
• War Crimes (in company with China, Syria, Serbia and Pinochet's Chile)
  
• Secret Court (in company with Pakistan)
  
• Immunity from Judicial Review (in company with China)
  
• Continual Monitoring of Citizens (in company with Saudi Arabia and Cuba)
  
• Extraordinary Renditions
  

Somehow, I don't think this is the America that the Founding Fathers fought a revolution to create. In fact, it reads much more like the list of reasons that those same Founding Fathers gave as to why they considered King George III a tyrant in the Declaration of Independence.
Or, as professor Turley puts it ...

The framers lived under autocratic rule and understood this danger better than we do. James Madison famously warned that we needed a system that did not depend on the good intentions or motivations of our rulers: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”
Benjamin Franklin was more direct. In 1787, a Mrs. Powel confronted Franklin after the signing of the Constitution and asked, “Well, Doctor, what have we got — a republic or a monarchy?” His response was a bit chilling: “A republic, Madam, if you can keep it.”
Since 9/11, we have created the very government the framers feared: a government with sweeping and largely unchecked powers resting on the hope that they will be used wisely.

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Reality Check

If you want to know the real chances of something happening, check the Vegas odds. Of course, the Vegas odds don't really reflect those real chances, but just what is needed to get the betting money spread across the choices. But, in politics, where perception is everything, the public perceptions of reality as reflected by the odds the bookmakers offer to get the bets is probably a better indicator than any poll.

As of January 2012 ...

Obama - 2/3
Romney - 7/5
Paul - 25/1
Gingrich - 30/1
Santorum - 35/1
Huntsman - 50 /1

Since Perry is running behind a candidate that isn't even running (Hillary), I'll stop typing there.

Interesting is that Paul has moved up into 3rd place. Opensecrets.org reports that the Wall Street money is splitting so far between Romney and Obama. With Obama still the obvious favorite, they don't want to abandon him. And they appear to be succeeding in pushing Romney to the top of the Republican table. Thus creating what Wall Street always love is a non-contest between two politicians they've already bought.

The fly in this ointment is Ron Paul. He isn't bought by Wall Street, he opposes the wars, and he'd fight to restore civil liberties. He's not my perfect candidate, but he's in the race and running strong and has positioned himself as the one viable choice in these big party nomination fights that would end Wall Street rule in America.

If you oppose the wars. If you don't like having candidates who've been bought by Wall Street running everything. If you actually think the Bill of Rights is a good thing and we need to get back to honoring and respecting the deal that formed this government and approved this Constitution, then the only choice is to do everything you can to support Ron Paul. Vote for him if you can. Volunteer for him, help make phone calls, do whatever else you can do to support him too.

Its Obama, Romney and Paul. Two of the three represent no real change. One does represent change. And failing to support the candidate that does represent change is also a vote that you like things right now just fine and don't want any change from our endlessly expanding wars and rule by Wall Street all enforced by an ever growing surveillance state.

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Learning to Spot Propaganda

One of the keys to living intelligently in this modern media age is being able to accurately spot propaganda. In the old Soviet Union, citizens learned to be able to read between the lines. They learned to spot the obvious propaganda messages that were directed at them.

In this modern age, we need to be able to do the same. To somehow figure out what's really going on amongst the lies we are fed on a daily basis. We need to be able to know when to discard the obvious lies and other propaganda messages that are pushed at us daily.

This Glenn Greenwald article is a wonderful piece in exploring this. The subject is the recent car-bomb assassination of an Iranian nuclear scientists. And the fact that some western journalists and writers have accurately called this an act of terrorism. And the fact that these writers have been attacked for daring to state that the US or Israel appears to be engaged in acts that can only be properly described as terrorism.

Iran and the Terrorism game by Glenn Greewald from Salon.com

Part of the problem here is the pretense that Terrorism has some sort of fixed, definitive meaning. It does not. As Professor Remi Brulin has so exhaustively documented, the meaning of the term has constantly morphed depending upon the momentary interests of those nations (usually the U.S. and Israel) most aggressively wielding it. It’s a term of political propaganda, impoverished of any objective meaning, and thus susceptible to limitless manipulation. Even the formal definition incorporated into U.S. law is incredibly vague; one could debate forever without resolution whether targeted killings of scientists fall within its scope, and that’s by design. The less fixed the term is, the more flexibility there is in deciding what acts of violence are and are not included in its scope.

I remember that back after 9-11, there were writings and discussions about the definition of terrorism. The definition I remember goes something like this. "Acts of violence that kill or injure innocent civilians with the purpose of achieving a political goal".

The US and/or Israel apparently just killed an innocent scientist with the express political purpose of getting Iran not to continue its nuclear program. Of course, some might immediately respond that this scientist wasn't an 'innocent civilian' in that he was working on a nuclear bomb. But, this argument only rests on more propaganda. The IAEA has had inspectors looking at the Iranian nuclear program for at least a decade, and has never found a shred of evidence that any enrichment beyond what's needed for civilian reactors has ever occurred. And, such enrichment would be very hard to hide. The various intelligence agencies of the west have at times all concluded that the Iranians have no nuclear weapons program, only a peaceful civilian program. And of course, the Iranian government has consistently stated that they are only pursuing peaceful civilian uses of nuclear power.

I don't know who this man was, but it seems rather obvious that the facts point to him being a civilian scientist. One who is now dead because of a violent car-bomb attack. A man who is now undoubtedly being mourned by family and friends who loved him and who miss his presence in this world. This man is dead from an act of terrorism. And its an act of terrorism that was committed by either the US or our ally Israel.

If you want to understand the world, face up to the fact that the current government of the United States is a supporter of terrorism. Or, at the very least, that most of the rest of the world certainly has good reason to look at the United States as a supporter of terrorism.

It doesn't have to be this way. There were candidates on the last ballot for President who would not be supporting terrorist attacks against Iran. The voters of America had a choice not to support this policy. Yet, some 98% of American voters voted for candidates (McCain and Obama) who would clearly support and continue this policy. And only some 2% of American voters supported the candidates (McKinney, Nader, Barr) who would have opposed this policy.

If the thought of an American government that is an obvious supporter of terrorism bothers you, try voting for candidates that don't support this policy. If you voted for Obama or McCain in the last election, then you voted to support terrorism. If this bothers you, then please don't do that again in the next election. Votes for Obama, Romney or Gingrich are clearly and obviously votes for an America that is a supporter of terrorism.

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Dirty Trick

The Stolen War by Uri Avnery

What a dirty trick ... denying the generals their war by trying to take away their justification. Probably won't work. Being truthful in the reasons for going and killing more people isn't really a part of a general's DNA. Being a 'leader' and getting the killing and the maiming started by any means necessary is what they look for when picking generals.

Why is the war inevitable? Because of the terrorism, stupid. Hamas is a terrorist organization, isn’t it?

But along comes the supreme Hamas leader, Khaled Mash’al, and declares that Hamas has given up all violent action. From now on it will concentrate on non-violent mass demonstrations, in the spirit of the Arab Spring.

When Hamas forswears terrorism, there is no pretext for an attack on Gaza.

But is a pretext needed? Our army will not let itself be thwarted by the likes of Mash’al. When the army wants a war, it will have a war. This was proved in 1982, when Ariel Sharon attacked Lebanon, despite the fact that the Lebanese border had been absolutely quiet for 11 months. (After the war, the myth was born that it was preceded by daily shooting. Today, almost every Israeli can “remember” the shooting – an astonishing example of the power of suggestion.

Note one thing carefully. Whenever war with Iran is mentioned in the USA, its always presented as if it will be a nice, clean easy war. We'll fly our super jets in, we'll bomb some of the evil Iranian nuclear facilities, then we fly home. Meanwhile, the Iranian people will want to thank us so very much for bombing them that they'll rise up and pour out into the streets and overthrow their government. Then they'll line the streets and throw a party for the soldiers of the Great Satan when we arrive.

Of course, the first sign that this is total bull is the very basic fact that its being told to you by exactly the same people and the exact same TV channels and newspapers that told you that Iraq would be a cake-walk and that the Iraqis would stand by the road and cheer us and wave little American flags when we arrived. Basic common sense says that no one should be believing them this time.

But, in case you need more evidence and deeper analysis, read the end of Mr. Avnery's piece.

I do have some experience – some 60 or so years of it – but I did not leave any loophole. I said No War, and now General Gantz says the same in so many words. No Tehran, just poor little Gaza.

Why? Because of that one word: Hormuz.

Not the ancient Persian god Hormuzd, but the narrow strait that is the entrance and exit of the Persian Gulf, through which 20% of the world’s oil (and 35% of the sea-borne oil) flows. My contention was that no sane (or even mildly insane) leader would risk the closing of the strait, because the economic consequences would be catastrophic, even apocalyptic.

IT SEEMS that the leaders of Iran were not sure that all the world’s leaders read this column, so, just in case, they spelled it out themselves. This week they conducted conspicuous military maneuvers around the Strait of Hormuz, accompanied by the unequivocal threat to close it.

The US responded with vainglorious counter-threats. The invincible US Navy was ready to open the strait by force, if needed.

How, pray? The mightiest multi-billion aircraft carrier can be easily sunk by a battery of cheap land-to-sea missiles, as well as by small missile-boats.

Let’s assume Iran starts to act out its threats. The whole might of the US air force and navy is brought to bear. Iranian ships will be sunk, missile and army installations bombed. Still the Iranian missiles will come in, making passage through the strait impossible.

What next? There will be no alternative to “boots on the ground”. The US army will have to land on the shore and occupy all the territory from which missiles can be effectively launched. That would be a major operation. Fierce Iranian resistance must be expected, judging from the experience of the eight-year Iraqi-Iranian war. The oil wells in neighboring Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states will also be hit.

Remember, Iran is three times the size and population of Iraq. Iran will be at least three times a more difficult war than Iraq. And, to Iran, we've been the Great Satan for almost two generations now. The USA was the country that forced the evil and corrupt Shah upon them and kept him in power. The USA was the country who's CIA was training the Shah's secret police in the torture techniques used upon the Iranians. The Iranians threw this off with a revolution that drove the Shah and the USA from power in Iran. The USA has been fighting the Iranians in one way or another in a constant effort to return to power over the Iranians ever since. Any suggestion that the Iranians will not fight against the USA with the utmost of resolve and determination is utter nonsense. If we go to open and full war against Iran, the only people bringing flowers to our troops will have suicide-bomb vests strapped to themselves.

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(D) is for Liar

As we move into another election year, just remember, (D) is for Liar. The Dems will say whatever they think you want to hear. But it doesn't mean they'll do any of it.

No signing statements to nullify instructions from Congress
"While it is legitimate for a president to issue a signing statement to clarify his understanding of ambiguous provisions of statutes and to explain his view of how he intends to faithfully execute the law, it is a clear abuse of power to use such statements as a license to evade laws that the president does not like or as an end-run around provisions designed to foster accountability. I will not use signing statements to nullify or undermine congressional instructions as enacted into law."

That's what Obama used to say about signing statements in 2007-8. From http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/obameter/promise/516/no-signing-statements-nullify-instruction-congress/ quoting Boston Globe.

Compare that to this ... from emptywheel blog

Obama’s signing statement on the defense authorization was about what I expected. He included squishy language so as to pretend he doesn’t fully support indefinite detention. And he basically promised to ignore much of the language on presumptive military detention.

But there was one part of the signing statement I (naively) didn’t expect. It’s this:

Sections 1023-1025 needlessly interfere with the executive branch’s processes for reviewing the status of detainees. Going forward, consistent with congressional intent as detailed in the Conference Report, my Administration will interpret section 1024 as granting the Secretary of Defense broad discretion to determine what detainee status determinations in Afghanistan are subject to the requirements of this section.

Section 1024, remember, requires the Defense Department to actually establish the provisions for status reviews that Obama has promised but not entirely delivered.

There isn't really that much doubt about Congressional intent in Section 1024. Neither in the language nor in the debate. This is later, also from theemptywheel ...

Lindsey Graham (and other bill supporters, both the right and left of Lindsey) repeatedly insisted on this review provision. Lindsey promised every detainee would get real review of his status.

I want to be able to tell anybody who is interested that no person in an American prison–civilian or military–held as a suspected member of al-Qaida will be held without independent judicial review. We are not allowing the executive branch to make that decision unchecked. For the first time in the history of American warfare, every American combatant held by the executive branch will have their day in Federal court, and the government has to prove by a preponderance of the evidence you are in fact part of the enemy force.

And yet, in spite of the fact that Section 1024 includes no exception for those detained at Bagram, Obama just invented such an exception.

Section 1024 was one of the few good parts of the detainee provisions in this bill, because it would have finally expanded the due process available to the thousands of detainees who are hidden away at Bagram now with no meaningful review.

But Obama just made that good part disappear.

Remember, (D) is for Liar. Although, the line about "Obama made the good part disappear" could also be a wonderful description of his whole Presidency.

Remember, when the generation that had fought a long revolutionary war against the British Empire tried to design a government that would protect the unalienable rights that they had fought for and won, they envisioned a weak executive branch who's role was to execute the will of Congress.

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Merry Christmas

To any Christians who read this, Merry Christmas. To all others, may you also have a merry time at your holidays around the winter solstice.

Christians celebrate on this day the birth of the man known as the Prince of Peace. A man who came to us to teach us to live peacefully with each other, and to treat each of our fellow human beings as a brother and sister. The man who tried to teach us to love even our enemies.

In a few months, the Christians will also celebrate the death of this man who was tortured and killed by his fellow monkeys for speaking such heresy. Seems like not a lot has changed in 2000 years.

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A Tale of Two Iraqis

Iraqi PM chides Sunni provinces pushing for autonomy, warns of ‘rivers of blood’ from the Washington Post.

Two Iraqis. The first is the Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki. He's the one speaking with the quote that made the headline warning of "rivers of blood". It seems the Sunni areas, after being pretty much kicked out of the government by the PM, and who have seen one of their political leaders arrested on 'terrorism' charges, are talking about using the portion of the Iraqi constitution that allows for autonomous regions (like the US supported Kurdish areas) to gain some independence from the Shite-dominated central government. In response, Mr. al-Maliki is making speeches warning of 'rivers of blood'.

Remember, that Mr. al-Maliki is the hand-picked, US choice to lead Iraq. In 2006, when he was first chosen to be prime minister, the Americans were deeply involved in the 'process' and certainly were not going to let a choice unacceptable to them into power. Mr. al-Maliki has bent over backwards of course to be favorable to the Americans and to let the American military do whatever its wanted to do in Iraqi.

So, the pro-American and put into office by America Prime Minister is the one making speeches talking about 'rivers of blood' if a faction does something he doesn't like. I guess the Iraqis got about the same 'change' from Saddam that Americans got in 'changing' from Dubya to Obama.

Then, buried much later down in this Washington Post story, there's a second Iraqi. This is the Iraqi that the American government has always hated. He is of course described by the propaganda writer at the WaPo as the "anti-American Shiite cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr". If you only read the WaPo, you'd probably think 'anti-American' is the man's real first name as he can not apparently be mentioned without this editorial comment/smear being applied to his name first. The WaPo isn't about presenting facts and letting readers make up their own minds. Nope, they have to tell you he's the 'anti-American' cleric before they tell you anything else.

But, listen to what Muqtada al-Sadr is talking about.

Iraq’s anti-American Shiite cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr, launched an initiative Saturday calling for peaceful coexistence among all Iraqis after the withdrawal of U.S. troops from the country. The last soldiers left Dec. 18.

Al-Sadr, whose militiamen were blamed for sectarian killings during the worst years of Iraq’s violence, is seeking to assert his political weight Iraq after the U.S. pullout.

Al-Sadr’s proposal comes just two days after a terrifying wave of Baghdad bombings killed 69 people and wounded nearly 200. The bombs tore through mostly Shiite neighborhoods of the Iraqi capital, evoking fears the country could descend into a new round of sectarian violence.

Al-Sadr’s associates handed out to the media a 14-point “peace code” proposal written by the radical cleric. It warns against spilling Iraqi blood and urges respect for all religions, sects and ethnic groups.

Al-Sadr’s aide Salah al-Obeidi described the code as an attempt “to preserve the unity of the country and save it from fighting.”

Remember, America has been trying to crush and drive away Mr. al-Sadr for years now. The Us has openly declared war on him at least once back around 2004 when they invaded the poor "Sadr City" (named after his father) neighborhood of Baghdad to try to kill or detain/torture Mr. Sadr and his followers. And generally, its been a constant theme of American 'leadership' in Iraq to try to keep Mr. Sadr and his political party/faction out of any positions of power. Reserving those for the likes of Mr. al-Maliki. Even now, notice the great lengths the WaPo goes to try to tell you to hate this man in this article.

So, we see before us two Iraqis. One is pro-American, and who has been put into power and largely kept there by the Americans. He's the one talking about 'rivers of blood' in warning his political opponents to do what he demands. The other is 'anti-American' and has been opposed at every turn by the Americans who at times have tried to kill or arrest him. He's the one talking about peace. The one the Americans hate, and the one who propaganda organs like the WaPo constantly teach Americans back home to hate, that's the one trying to talk about peace. He's the one trying to get Iraqis to follow the simple rule of not shedding the blood of their fellow Iraqis.

Says an awful lot about American foreign policy. America obviously supports 'rivers of blood' while opposing the idea of peaceful coexistence. And we wonder why they hate us?

And, if you want to understand why the Iranians don't seem to like us much either, remember that we've done the same thing in their relatively recent history. America led the coup against the democratically elected Mossadegh government and replaced it with the dictatorial rule of the 'Shah of Iran'. After the CIA overthrew the Iranian democracy, it spent the next 20 years teaching and training the Shah's Savak secret police how to torture and kill and disappear Iranian's who might favor democracy and freedom over life under a US puppet-dictator. Then, when the Iranian people had the nerve to overthrow our chosen tyrant, the US has hated Iran ever since and constantly schemed to try to find a way to once again overthrow the Iranian democracy that replace our puppet/tyrant.

And, we wonder why they hate us?

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