Once upon a time

Telling the tale of Syria's civil war and how it began.

Record-sized ozone hole.. but nothing to worry about here.

Proof that animals are plotting to take over the world... unless we kill them all first.  Or maybe they'll take themselves out...

The Rude Pundit is rude about Kentucky.

The European Refugee Crisis and Syria Explained

Iraq explained in five minutes (greatly simplified)

So good to hear in this era of bad news..

Richard Engle is safe.  Thank goodness.

Was Georgie drinking again?

Or is it Cheney trying to hand over a smoking ruin to Obama?

Syria has said American troops carried out a raid inside Syria along the Iraqi border, killing eight people - if the claims are true then this will be the first military incursion by the US into Syrian territory from Iraq.

But its timing is curious, coming right at the end of the Bush administration's period of office and at a moment when many of America's European allies - like Britain and France - are trying to broaden their ties with Damascus.

Whatever the local military factors involved in this US operation, it would be unthinkable to imagine that an incursion into Syria would not require a policy decision at a high-level.

The movement of insurgents and foreign fighters from Syria into Iraq has long been a bone of contention between Damascus and Washington.

The US argument has always been that the Syrians are not doing enough to control the border. The Syrians have always countered that they are unfairly being blamed for turmoil inside Iraq that is not of their making.

Quite apart from their differences over Iraq, Washington sees Syria as unhelpful in Lebanon and as far too friendly with Iran.

The idea of blowing up the Middle East if Obama wins isn't just imagination:

WASHINGTON - Former US Ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton, said on Tuesday that he believes Israel will stage a raid against Iran's nuclear facilities if Democratic nominee Senator Barack Obama wins the upcoming presidential elections.

All we need now are jackboots and some cool armbands

Emily Feder experiences how we are treating travelers at airports:

At JFK Airport, Denying Basic Rights Is Just Another Day at the Office By Emily Feder

I was recently stopped by Homeland Security as I was returning from a trip to Syria. What I saw in the hours that followed shocked and disturbed me

I arrived at JFK Airport two weeks ago after a short vacation to Syria and presented my American passport for re-entry to the United States. After 28 hours of traveling, I had settled into a hazy awareness that this was the last, most familiar leg of a long journey. I exchanged friendly words with the Homeland Security official who was recording my name in his computer. He scrolled through my passport, and when his thumb rested on my Syrian visa, he paused. Jerking toward the door of his glass-enclosed booth, he slid my passport into a dingy green plastic folder and walked down the hallway, motioning for me to follow with a flick of his wrist. Where was he taking me, I asked him. "You'll find out," he said.

[snip]

No one who had been detained knew precisely why they were there. A few people were led into private rooms; others were questioned out in the open at desks a few feet from the crowd and then allowed to pass through customs. Some were sent to another section of the holding area with large computer screens and cameras, and then brought back. The uninformed consensus among the detainees was that some people would be fingerprinted, have their irises scanned and be sent back to the countries from which they had disembarked, regardless of citizenship status; others would be fingerprinted and allowed to stay; and the unlucky ones would be detained indefinitely and moved to a more permanent facility.

[snip]

To be powerless and mocked at the same time makes one feel ashamed, which leads quickly to rage. Within a few hours of my arrival, I saw at least 10 people denied the right to use the bathroom or buy food and water. I watched my traveling companion duck under a barrier, run to the bathroom and slip back into the holding section -- which, of course, someone of another ethnicity in a state of panic would be very reluctant to do. The United States is good at naming enemies, but apparently we are even better at making them, especially of individuals. I don't know if it's worse for national security -- and more embarrassing for Americans -- that this is the first experience tourists have of our country, or that some U.S. citizens get treated this way upon entering their own country.

[snip]

After four hours, I finally demanded to speak to the guards' supervisor, and he was called down. I asked if the detainees could file a formal complaint. He said there were complaint forms (which, in English and Spanish, direct one to the Department of Homeland Security's Web site, where one must enter extensive personal information in order to file a "Trip Summary") but initially refused to hand them out or to give me his telephone number. "The Department of Homeland Security is understaffed, underfunded, and I have men here who are doing 14-hour days." He tried to intimidate me when I wrote down his name -- "So, you're writing down our names. Well, we have more on you" -- and asked me questions about my address and my profession in front of the rest of the people detained. I pointed out a few of the families who had missed their flights and had been waiting seven hours. His voice barely controlled, his lip curled into a smirk, he explained slowly, condescendingly, that they need only go to the ticket counter at Jet Blue and reschedule so they could fly out in an hour. One mother responded with what he must have already known: Jet Blue goes to most destinations only once or twice a day and her whole family would have to sleep in the airport.

A large crowd began to gather. Everyone wanted to voice complaints. I explained to the supervisor that his guards had been making people afraid. He flipped through the green files, tossing the American passports to the front of the pile. "You should have gone first, before these people. American citizens first -- that's how it should be." In the face of dozens of requests and questions, he turned and left.

The guards processed me then, ignoring the order of arrivals, if there ever had been one. They refused to distribute more complaint forms or call the supervisor back down at the request of Arab families. One officer threatened, "I'm talking politely to you now. If you don't sit down, I won't be talking politely to you anymore." One announced that because "the American girl" had gotten angry, the families would have to wait a few more hours. "The supervisor is not coming back."

[snip](my bold)

In the past five years I have worked for human rights and refugee advocacy organizations in Serbia, Russia and Croatia, including the International Rescue Committee and USAID. I have traveled to many different places, some supposedly repressive, and have never seen people treated with the kind of animosity that Homeland Security showed that night. In Syria, border control officers were stern but polite. At other borders there have been bureaucracies to contend with -- excruciating for both Americans and other foreign nationals. I've met Russian officials with dead, suspicious looks in their eyes and arms tired from stamping so many visas, but in America, the Homeland Security officials I encountered were very much alive -- like vultures waiting to eat.

Under the Bush administration, this is what we have become. Realize that it is not just focused on 'suspicious brown Arab-looking' people, but anyone. The Bush administration is encouraging this kind of inhumane and arrogant indifference. Under which stone did these Homeland Security officials come from? Who ARE these thugs and bureaucratic incompetents?

We want their names.

Omg, Bush's bestest buds are appeasers!

To refresh memories:

Appeasement:
to yield or concede to the belligerent demands of (a nation, group, person, etc.) in a conciliatory effort, sometimes at the expense of justice or other principles.

So what do you call this?

PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN -- Pakistani authorities announced Wednesday that they had struck a truce with a militant faction that moved last year to impose Taliban-style rule in a once-popular tourist area.

The deal between government officials and Islamic militants in the scenic Swat valley could presage broader accords with militants in the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.

The 15-point pact was signed despite explicit expressions of concern from the United States about such truces -- the latest warning delivered only a day earlier by Deputy Secretary of State John D. Negroponte in Washington.

Pakistan's new coalition government, which took office seven weeks ago after winning parliamentary elections in February, has said it is willing to talk with extremists who are prepared to renounce violence. But the Bush administration and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization say they believe that Islamic militants will use respites to strengthen and rearm themselves and resume attacks when it suits them. They also say cross-border strikes aimed at Western troops in Afghanistan have edged up since negotiations began.

[snip]

Under the pact, the government appeared to have made significant concessions. It agreed to begin pulling back troops, provided that attacks against the military cease. The government suggested that Fazlullah, previously one of the country's most wanted men, would not be actively pursued. It also agreed that the Swat valley would come under a system of Sharia, or Islamic law, with Islamic clerics and scholars advising civil judges.

In return, the militants softened some of the harsher measures they had taken to enforce their stringent form of Islam. They agreed to stop their campaign against polio vaccinations, which they have denounced as a Western plot, and girls' schooling. They also promised to stop terrorizing barbers who shaved men's beards and blowing up music and video stores.

As part of the agreement, Fazlullah's followers pledged not to display weapons in public, though they did not agree to disarm. The group's former heavily fortified headquarters is to be turned into a university, both sides said.

Pakistan's last consession allowed the Taliban to reorganize and gain strength. What is this going to do?

And, clutch those pearls, Mabel, Israel is an appeaser, too!:

JERUSALEM -- In February 2007, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, met privately for more than two hours in Turkey.

The two leaders concluded that the time was ripe for Turkey to mediate indirect peace negotiations between longtime enemies Israel and Syria.

The existence and extent of those negotiations were acknowledged by all sides Wednesday, prompting speculation as to the timing, goals and prospects for success.

Syrian President Bashar Assad disclosed the negotiations last month, saying Turkish mediators had informed him that Israel was willing to return the disputed Golan Heights to Syria.

Israel declined to confirm the talks at the time, but an Israeli official said Wednesday's coordinated statements out of Jerusalem, Damascus and Ankara were a sign that "the discussions had advanced" to a more serious level.

The Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the U.S. government had been "fully briefed" from the start on the initiative.

Georgie, you knew about these dangerous diplomatic appeasement-related program activities for a year? And didn't tell us?

I thought talking to the enemy was evil and bad?

crossposted at SteveAudio

With Fallon gone and Petraeus in charge,

Iran is now within reach for Cheney and the neocons:

WASHINGTON - The nomination of General David Petraeus to be the new head of the US Central Command ensures that he will be available to defend the George W Bush administration's policies on Iran and Iraq at least to the end of Bush's term and possibly even beyond.

It also gives Vice President Dick Cheney greater freedom of action to exploit the option of an air attack against Iran during the administration's final months.

Petraeus will take up the CENTCOM post in late summer or early autumn, according to Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

The ability of the administration to threaten Iran with an attack both publicly and behind the scenes had been dramatically reduced in 2007 by opposition from the former CENTCOM commander, Admiral William Fallon, until he stepped down from the post under pressure from Gates and the White House last month.

Petraeus has proved himself willing to cooperate closely with the White House on Iraq and Iran, arguing against any post-"surge" reduction in troop strength and blaming Iran for challenges to the US military presence. Along with the deference to Petraeus in Congress and the media, his pliability on those issues made him the obvious choice to replace Fallon.

But Petraeus had already effectively taken over many of the powers of the CENTCOM commander last year.

As the top commander in Iraq, he was in theory beneath Fallon in the chain of command. In reality, Petraeus ignored Fallon's views and took orders directly from the White House. Petraeus was in effect playing the role of CENTCOM commander in regard to the twin issues of Iraq and Iran.

Fallon clashed with Petraeus repeatedly from the beginning of his command about the "surge" and US withdrawal from Iraq. Fallon opposed the "surge" and believed the US should begin the withdrawal of most of its troops from Iraq, but he was effectively stymied by the close Petraeus-White House link from being able to influence US military policy in Iraq and the region as a whole.

Fallon had also pushed very hard, according to a source familiar with his thinking, for trying to negotiate an agreement with Iran over innocent passage through the Strait of Hormuz to ease tensions caused by US-Iranian differences over the obligations of navy vessels transiting the strait. But any such negotiations would have conflicted with the administration's emphasis on confrontation with Iran, and they weren't interested.

So what did Cheney do right after Fallon was booted?

Fallon's resignation announcement on March 11 was followed less than a week later by a 10-day Cheney trip to the Middle East in which the vice president talked explicitly about the military option against Iran during visits to Turkey and Saudi Arabia. That suggested that Cheney felt freer to wield the military threat to Iran with Fallon neutralized.

Cheney aggressively solicited political support from Turkish leaders for a US strike against Iranian nuclear facilities during his visit to Turkey last month, according to a source familiar with Cheney's meeting in Ankara.

Cheney was "very aggressive" in asking Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and President Abdullah Gul, as well as Turkey's chief of general staff General Yasar Bukyukanit to get "on board" with such an attack, according to the source, who has access to reports from the Cheney visit.

Remember what the reaction of the Saudis was right after Cheney's visit: researching procedures to handle radioactive fallout.

And why did the Bush administration 'open up' the file on Israel's bombing of Syria unless it was to prepare the world for the inevitable bombing strikes on Iran? You have to ask why they did it right now, because they've never released any kind of information unless it benefits their agenda:

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration went public Thursday with sensitive intelligence meant to show that North Korea spent years helping Syria build a covert facility for nuclear weapons before the plant was destroyed in an Israeli airstrike last year.

The disclosures offered a rare look at evidence gathered by U.S. and allied intelligence agencies and were part of a choreographed campaign by the administration to put pressure not only on North Korea and Syria, but also on other adversaries accused of pursuing nuclear weapons, including Iran.

The previously classified information included satellite images of the Syrian facility, photos of a man identified as a North Korean nuclear expert in Syria, as well as pictures taken by someone with access to the structure as it was being built.

The photos were presented in a glossy dossier that called attention to similarities between the Syrian plant, at a desert site called Al Kibar, and North Korea's nuclear reactor at Yongbyon.

The evidence left several questions unanswered, such as how Damascus would fuel the plant or manufacture bombs, and was greeted with skepticism by some nuclear experts and foreign officials.

U.S. intelligence officials acknowledged that they had not obtained evidence indicating Syria was working on nuclear weapons designs and had not identified a source of nuclear material for the facility.

In detailing the alleged North Korean-Syrian cooperation and the destruction of the plant, the Bush administration broke a long silence. U.S. officials confirmed the Israeli attack on the site and indicated that they had cooperated intensively with the Israelis on intelligence and policy issues. They denied any U.S. involvement in planning or executing the Sept. 6 strike.

Further into the article:

As the briefings concluded, the White House issued a statement condemning North Korea and Syria and warning Iran that it should relinquish any nuclear weapons aspirations.

I don't think this has anything to do with Syria or North Korea.

They're going to bomb Iran and hand the disaster over to the Democratic president. Two birds with one 500 ton bomb.

Update: And here is more preparation of the excuses we'll give:

WASHINGTON -- The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff today accused Iran of increasing its shipments of weapons to militants in Iraq, despite promises by Iranian leaders that they would cut off the flow of arms.

Adm. Michael G. Mullen, the Joint Chiefs chairman, said there was not a massive infusion of weapons but said over time there had been "a consistent increase" in arms shipments. Speaking at a morning news conference, Mullen said weapons had been intercepted in Iraq that showed evidence of relatively recent manufacture in Iran, adding that Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq, would lay out a fuller account of the evidence in the weeks to come.

Update: Sinfonian of Blast Off says it better.

crossposted at American Street

You know those Iraqis who are streaming back into Iraq?

They aren't going willingly:(link via Moonbootica of Devizes Melting Pot)

DAMASCUS, 22 November 2007 (IRIN) - Lack of funds and the Syrian government’s refusal to renew their visas, more than the perception of improved security in Iraq, are prompting some Iraqi refugees in Syria to return to Iraq, according to personal refugee accounts and figures from the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

The Iraqi government recently announced that 46,000 refugees returned to Iraq in October, mostly from Syria, while a Syrian immigration source said that between 1 October and 19 November 60,000 people had returned to Iraq.

Some media reports and Iraqi government officials have suggested the refugees are returning because of improved security following the US military “surge” earlier this year.

However, in a report released on 22 November, the UNHCR - which interviewed 110 Iraqis in Syria this week - found that only 14 percent of respondents said they were returning to Iraq because they believed the security situation had improved, as opposed to 70 percent who cited financial and visa reasons.

“I have no money because I’m not allowed to work,” said an Iraqi man waiting by the Iraqi embassy in Damascus, and who wished to remain anonymous. He and his family are planning to leave Syria for Iraq on 26 November. “Also my official visa has run out and the Syrian government won’t renew it.”

The majority of the estimated 1.5 million Iraqi refugees in Syria are not allowed to work legally and, with the price of basic commodities and rent soaring, many who have used up their savings in Syria are now unable to afford to stay any longer.

Update: Another viewpoint:

GENEVA (AFP) — The United Nations refugee agency on Friday expressed concerns over reports Iraqi refugees are returning to the country, particularly from neighbouring Syria, saying there was no large-scale movement.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees "does not believe that the time has come to promote, organise or encourage returns" given the volatile and unpredictable security situation in Iraq, spokeswoman Jennifer Pagonis told journalists.

"Presently, there is no sign of any large-scale return to Iraq," she added.

More than 1.4 million Iraqis have fled to Syria since the US-led invasion of 2003, but they are coming under increased bureaucratic and financial pressure as the country's social infrastructure struggles with the influx.

A survey by UN staff in Syria found that the majority of returning Iraqi families are doing so because they are running out of money or resources and facing difficult living conditions, or because their visas have expired.

Syria imposed visa requirements on Iraqis from October 1. Those seeking to enter the country must now obtain visas from the Syrian embassy in Baghdad, which are given only for commercial, transport, scientific or educational reasons.

Iraq said earlier this week that it will offer Syria 15 million dollars (10 million euros) to help pay the costs of sheltering refugees.

Riverbend

Via Pygalgia, Riverbend weeps for her country:

After all, refugees are people who sleep in tents and have no potable water or plumbing, right? Refugees carry their belongings in bags instead of suitcases and they don’t have cell phones or Internet access, right? Grasping my passport in my hand like my life depended on it, with two extra months in Syria stamped inside, it hit me how wrong I was. We were all refugees. I was suddenly a number. No matter how wealthy or educated or comfortable, a refugee is a refugee. A refugee is someone who isn’t really welcome in any country- including their own... especially their own.

We live in an apartment building where two other Iraqis are renting. The people in the floor above us are a Christian family from northern Iraq who got chased out of their village by Peshmerga and the family on our floor is a Kurdish family who lost their home in Baghdad to militias and were waiting for immigration to Sweden or Switzerland or some such European refugee haven.

The first evening we arrived, exhausted, dragging suitcases behind us, morale a little bit bruised, the Kurdish family sent over their representative – a 9 year old boy missing two front teeth, holding a lopsided cake, “We’re Abu Mohammed’s house- across from you- mama says if you need anything, just ask- this is our number. Abu Dalia’s family live upstairs, this is their number. We’re all Iraqi too... Welcome to the building.”

I cried that night because for the first time in a long time, so far away from home, I felt the unity that had been stolen from us in 2003.

I am so sorry, Riverbend. You must thank George and Dick and the rest of the PNAC gang for your predicament.

Israel did launch an air strike on Syria

Jerusalem, Israel (AHN)-After weeks of refusing to confirm the operation, former Israeli prime minister and Likud opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu admitted that Israel launched an air strike against Syria on September 6.

Speaking on Israeli TV, Netanyahu said he gave current prime minister Ehud Olmert his backing on the Syrian raid, but refused to go into detail on the air attack.

"When a prime minister does something that is important in my view and necessary to Israel's security... I give my backing. And here, too, I was a partner in the issue from the start, and I gave my backing" Netanyahu told Channel 1 news.

Although Netanyahu refused to go into details about the Israeli strike, earlier reports speculated that the Israeli F-15 jets targeted a factory in northern Syria where North Korean nuclear material was stored. Other "leaked" reports have said the Sept. 6 attack was to send a message to Damascus to stop supporting the terrorist group Hezbollah, which Israel battled in a brief war last year.

Israel and Syria have technically been at war since peace talks broke down in 2000, with tensions between the two counties rising in recent months. While, Syria insists that peace talks are contingent upon Israel returning the Golan Heights, which it seized in 1967, Israel maintains that Syria first abandon its support for Lebanese and Palestinian terrorist groups before talks can resume.

Update 9/22: Bryan of Why Now? has more on the event and links.

Israel invades Syrian airspace

Israel invades Syrian airspace:

Last week, four Israeli warplanes invaded Syrian airspace after midnight on September 6, breaking the sound barrier, and reaching as far as the village of Tal Abyad in the vicinity of Deir al-Zour, about 160 kilometers north of the city of Raqqa. A military source in Syria was quoted saying that the Israelis violated Syrian airspace "through the southern border, coming from the Mediterranean front toward the northeastern one".

Syrian defenses confronted the Israeli planes, forcing them to drop their fuel and ammunition so they could fly higher and faster and escape. "We warn the Israeli enemy government against this flagrant aggressive act, and retain the right to respond in an appropriate way," the military spokesman said. Witnesses reported seeing the warplanes at about 1:30am, but thought they were US ones, not Israeli.

The news caused a stir around the world, although it was pretty much expected by observers of the Syrian-Israeli front. There has been much speculation about an outbreak of hostilities between Damascus and Israel since June. Both countries had been mobilizing troops, raising the prospects of war, until Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak came out one week before the military operation saying his country was going to withdraw its troops from the Golan border. Israel captured the Golan Heights in 1967 in the Six Day War and, since then, the countries have been in bitter dispute.

War was not an option, the Israeli minister seemed to be saying. He added that mobilization raised the risk of an "accidental incident" between both armies, something that Israel wanted to avoid. For their part, the Syrians have been saying that their strategic choice is peace - not war - with Israel, reminding the world on every possible occasion that they had engaged in the peace process, under US auspices, for 15 years.

If both countries want peace, as the official version implies, then what exactly happened on September 6? One theory says Israel wanted to test Syrian defenses, especially after reports that Damascus had received new ballistic missiles from Russia. The objectives of the intrusion would be to "feel the waters" before Israel actually engaged in war with the Syrians. This was seconded by Israeli counter-terrorism expert Boaz Ganor, who said his country was "collecting intelligence on long-range missiles" deployed by Syria in the north.

Cheney's plan for carpet bombing Iran

Now involves Syria?

ROME - A senior U.S. nuclear official said Friday that North Koreans were in Syria and that Damascus may have had contacts with "secret suppliers" to obtain nuclear equipment.

The neocons obviously realize the jig is up and they will never again be so close to their dreams of imperial superpowerdom. In for a penny, in for a pound. Might as well go for broke...

The next step will be blowing everything up as a distraction for the next administration to deal with as they leave out the back door with the last of the treasury and the PNAC plans to rule the universe tucked under their shirts.

Update: Tom Legg of The Daai Tou Laam Diary catches Tom Friedman criticizing China for not throwing their weight around in support for economic sanctions on Iran:

Josh at ChinaExpat has some further thoughts on Friedman's time at Dalian.

His most recent pronouncement, lecturing Beijing about Iran and Sudan, looks strangely like a false argument that he has been persistently making over the years. According to RConversation he lectured Chinese officials that the country is "a freeloader" on the diplomatic front. He argues that they let the US work to solve the world's problems while China does nothing, and that Beijing will live to rue the day they made this choice.

This sounds just like an argument that he was making just before the Iraq invasion: "China is behaving as if the Iraq crisis were for America to resolve. That is a serious mistake."

That thought must make the neocons salivate ... having the towering presence of China behind their threats. I think China would rather sit back and watch the neocons completely unravel and take the U.S. down with them than join us in our self-made quagmire.

Riverbend is back!

In Syria.

(Via PSoTD)

While Bush pretends to build democracies, Al-Maliki branches out

And visits Syria:

DAMASCUS -- Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al Maliki is due in Damascus Monday, on his second visit to a US foe this month after a trip to Syria's main regional ally Iran.

It is Maliki's first visit to Syria since he became premier, early last year, although he was based in Damascus in the 1990s when in exile during the rule of executed dictator Saddam Hussein.

Maliki will be accompanied on the three-day visit by his ministers of oil, trade, the interior, and water resources, his office in Baghdad said.

Syria and Iraq only restored diplomatic ties last November, 26 years after they were broken under Saddam over Syria's support for Iran in its eight-year war with Iraq.

The rapprochement paved the way for a week-long visit to Syria in January by Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, another formerly-Damascus-based exile, who secured a promise from his opposite number, Bashar Al Assad, to work to "eradicate terrorism."

The United States had been strongly critical of the role in Iraq of both Iran and Syria since its 2003 invasion.

But Maliki's Shiite-led government has friendly relations with Iran and, earlier this month, the prime minister drew White House criticism after he held cordial meetings with Iranian officials.

What does the Bush administration's irritation over al-Maliki's outreach to Iran and Syria actually mean when Bush and Cheney really like dictatorships rather than democracy?

Laura Rozen of War and Piece:

The WP's Peter Baker missed a few important insights in its piece on why Bush's democracy vision has stalled. The two biggest: Bush's vision of overturning tyranny and bringing democracy to Iraq has been dashed in massive sectarian bloodshed, loss of life, turmoil, insurgency, uncertainty and heartbreak and a massive devotion of US resources that might have gone to promoting grand things lots of places, and secondly, that in many targeted countries, promoting democracy would mean allowing Islamist groups, some designated as terrorist groups by the Bush administration, to prevail. The piece left out so many big examples of the contradictions -- Musharraf/Pakistan, Saudi Arabia whose corrupt royal family is so close to the White House and Cheney's office, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt -- of where Bush has decided he isn't quite sure he really wants democratic realities to be realized, and he just may prefer the tyrant, as Cheney openly does in Kazakhstan and Saudi Arabia. While the piece would seem to promote a few voices blaming the stalling of Bush's grand vision on the bureaucrats in the U.S. government, it also tried to save itself from total ingratiation with the White House by naming responsible the office of the vice president's "little-girl crush on strongmen." But how did it miss how corrupted and stalled and conflicted is the vision at the very top of the U.S. government -- with the president himself -- and the realities the president has found himself confronting? Bush is now using all the Sunni tyrants, the autocrats, royals and propped up, hardly a two of them democratically elected, to counter Iran, for instance. Bush have a hard time with the policy? Congress may be interested to know due to the $30 billion in military aid to those states it's being asked to approve by the Bush White House.

The U.S. government may be in serious trouble if and when Pakistan's military dictator falls. Same the hideously corrupted Saudi royal family, so personally close with Bush and Cheney. They don't seem to have too much use for democracy when it comes to their friends, the corrupt autocrats. It's hard to understand how the piece skipped such big glaring points and contradictions, as if Bush's pure longing for democracy in the world had not been sabotaged by nothing so much as conflicts of interest going to the very top, and U.S. national security interests defined by the very top. How would we know if Bush were really serious about democracy? If he told Riyadh to stuff it. That's never going to happen, so we can rest assured that Bush is quite content to live with the art of the possible, with a very high degree of realism, and any griping about the bureaucrats is something journalists should know better than to accept as more than a wink-nod excuse for the president's own decisions to compromise his vision of promoting democracy.

I don't know... I don't think Bush ever tried to smear democracy around the world. I think saying that gave him an excuse to activate wars to protect our freedoms, to pervert the Constitution, to deny Americans their civil liberties, to amass more power for the White House.

I really never have gotten the sense Bush gives a fuck about democracy.

I think I've discovered the reason we attacked Iraq

After 9/11. We used CNN for directions and bombed the wrong country:



It's all 'over there somewhere' to these people, isn't it? Doesn't really matter which country we attack, they're all the same...

Hey, can'tcha take a joke?

Jokes about bombing Tehran, calling you evil doers, the axis of evil, the lovers of terrorism... jokes, all jokes!:

TEHRAN (Reuters) - The United States is showing signs of softening its attitude towards Iran, an Iranian official said on Sunday, but added that Tehran had not yet decided to attend a meeting on Iraq with senior U.S. officials.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini said Iran would decide after talks this week with Iraq's foreign minister whether it would take part in an international conference next month to discuss the conflict in neighboring Iraq.

Egypt will host the high-level meeting of a group of countries that includes Syria, Turkey and the United States in the first week of May to discuss how to stop the violence in Iraq. The conference is a follow-up to one in Baghdad in March.

An Iranian newspaper reported earlier this month that Iran might not attend if U.S. forces do not release five Iranians they are holding in Iraq.

But Hosseini said Iran had not linked the meeting with other issues. "About participating or not participating, or the level of participation, this is still under examination," he told a regular briefing

[snip]

Hosseini suggested the United States was changing its stance towards Iran, saying in a response to a question:

"I agree with you on the softer tone from Miss Rice and in some American officials' statements ... it will be good if we witness this change in their behavior."

"If there is goodwill and if they correct the behavior they have had so far this will create a chance for reconsidering the kind of relations we have," he said.

Hosseini said he saw positive signs regarding the five Iranians held in Iraq, who Tehran says are diplomats but Washington accuses of links to Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards and of backing Iraqi militants.

Now if we could only do something about Cheney snarling in a corner over his 5 Iranian hostages....

Those attacks on Pelosi's visit to Syria?

Looks like it's Elliot Abrams. Think Progress:

Jim Lobe writes, “There is little doubt among Middle East analysts here that [Deputy National Security Adviser Elliott] Abrams is playing a lead role in White House efforts to discredit Pelosi for meeting with Assad,” just as he did in a similar incident in 1987.

UPDATE: “At the one and only meeting between Imad Moustapha, the Syrian ambassador to the United States, and a White House official, one of President Bush’s closest advisers, Elliot Abrams, said the administration saw no good reason to ‘reward’ Syria by opening discussions.”

This man is a real neocon:

The same confusion was apparent at the White House, where National Security Council (NSC) official Elliott Abrams - the architect of US policy in the Middle East - was growing increasingly irritated with Rice's attempt to restart Israeli-Palestinian talks. Abrams, supported by officials in the Office of the Vice President, had consistently argued that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was a morass better left in the hands of the Israelis. That viewpoint was clear from the first days of the administration of President George W Bush, when Vice President Dick Cheney knocked down any attempt to re-engage with Israelis and Palestinians.

A Republican Party stalwart describes Cheney's views in blunt terms: "People would come to Bush and say we have to get focus on the peace process, and Cheney would sit there and say, 'Mr President, don't do it. These people have been fighting for 50 years. To hell with them. And look at what happened to [former president Bill] Clinton when he tried. It just got worse.' And Bush would nod his head and that would be the end of the discussion."

The NSC's concerns over Rice had deepened with reports that she had gone directly to Bush on a number of foreign-policy issues, circumventing both Abrams and Cheney. While it is traditional for a US secretary of state to confer directly with a president, Abrams, Rice and State Department official David Welch (the assistant secretary for Near Eastern affairs) had formed a seemingly unbreakable triumvirate on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Pelosi is evil and bad because she visits Syria part 2

Chester of Vanity Press discusses the Logan act and provides a list of all the other Speakers of the House and errant Congressmen who have stepped over the line:

The clear intent of this provision [Logan Act] is to prohibit unauthorized persons from intervening in disputes between the United States and foreign governments. Nothing in section 953 [Logan Act], however, would appear to restrict members of the Congress from engaging in discussions with foreign officials in pursuance of their legislative duties under the Constitution.

But, let's pretend for a moment that Pelosi's trip really did violate this act that has never been enforced and which does not apply to members of Congress in pursuit of their responsibilities. All right: let's look who else would have to be arrested for violation of the act:

• Newt Gingrich, for interfering with the Clinton administration's policy in China in 1997, and in Israel in 1998.
• Dennis Hastert, for interfering with the Clinton administration's policy in Columbia in 1998.
• Arlen Specter, for interfering with the Bush administration's policy in Syria in 2006, and offering to meet with the president of Iran.
• "Representatives Frank Wolf of Virginia, Joseph Pitts of Pennsylvania and Robert Aderholt of Alabama," for interfering with the Bush administration's policy in Syria three days before Pelosi.
  
• Jesse Helms, for undermining the Clinton administration's policy before the UN Security Council in 2000 (h/t John).
  
• Darrell Issa, for undermining the Bush administration's policy in Syria one day after Pelosi.
• David Hobson, for undermining the Bush administration's policy in Syria at the same time as Pelosi.
• Condoleeza Rice, whose State Department facilitated the visit, and thereby collaborated in the commission of a felony.
  
• George W. Bush, who specifically permitted the visit, and thereby aided and abetted the commission of a felony.

Would that be all right? Can we get these ten prominent Republicans in prison right away?

Update: Olvlzl of Echidne of the Snakes notes that Bush blocked Carter from visiting Syria; Issa (R) criticized Bush after visiting Syria right after Pelosi had been there and Pelosi had not said anything negative about Bush, and Pelosi has shown world class leadership. Thank god.

Why Pelosi is so dangerous even without her headscarf

To the neocon mindset:

..., the war against Pelosi is a rear-guard assault by the White House against moderates and liberals in both political parties who understand that the failed Bush policies have jeopardized American interests and hurt the Mideast peace process. What Wolf and Pelosi have in common is their endorsement of the Iraq Study Group's proposals, which emphasize regional diplomacy, including direct talks with both Syria and Iran. Indeed, it was Wolf who first approached James Baker about undertaking the Iraq report, and who sponsored the legislation that paid for the group's work.

The neoconservatives, both within and outside the White House, resent Pelosi for publicly dissenting from their ideology of war and their rejection of diplomacy. Their own vision has collapsed in ruins; they have gravely harmed the American military and discredited the ideals of democracy, and they have run out of ideas. That sucking sound is the vacuum of their minds.

Now in their bankruptcy, they can only smear those who, like Speaker Pelosi, are attempting to promote a bipartisan alternative. Let us hope she possesses the courage to continue that crucial mission.

But Pelosi's visit to Damascus had this reaction there:

"There is a feeling now that change is going on in American policy- even if it's being led by the opposition," said Ziad Haider, Damascus bureau chief for Al Safir, a leftist Lebanese daily. Syrian officials are increasingly betting on improved relations with American Democrats, whom they expect to lead the United States in coming years, Mr. Haider said. "Pelosi's approach represents a more practical policy; the administration's policy over the last few years has been based on demands and ideology," he said.

In Damascus's old section where Ms. Pelosi's name had become a household word, many spoke optimistically of an impending change in relations.

"Ms. Pelosi is going to be very happy in Syria," said Izzat Abdoulkarim, who runs an optical shop in downtown Damascus. "George Bush says we are bad, but she will see this is not true."

He added, emphatically: "She views the world through a different perspective than Bush. She's more open-minded."