Ronald Reagan Day passes the CA Senate, barf!

I really must be living in a nightmare and I'm in desperate need of rescue. TPC, where are you? Come wake me up! Tell me I'm just dreaming and it all really is just a bad dream!

So I'm listening to Karel on the radio today and he brought this insanity to my attention where the California Senate unanimously passed a bill honoring Ronald Reagan with his own special day. If this passes I guess we are all supposed to sing his praises for all the great and wonderful things he did for us and the world. You know, things like:

1. Refusing to do anything about the AIDS epidemic and letting thousands of people die from it (including my cousin),

2. Taking away free education in California and putting us on course to making a college education out of reach and impossibly expensive,

3. Closing down our mental institutions and tossing seriously mentally ill people on the streets,

4. Busting unions and sending labor into a virtual death spiral,

5. Raising taxes on the middle class while cutting taxes on the filthy rich,

6. And supporting right wing extremist in Central America who tortured and murdered hundreds of thousands of people.

How's that for starters? Anyone want to add to this list? Please do.

And so if this bill goes into law, next year on Ronald Reagan Day I will celebrate by barfing my guts out. How about you?

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War Crimes: Never Forget

Ishii Shiro

If you want to know why this Cat hasn't posted much of late, you should read about Ishii Shiro. Who, you might ask, is Ishii Shiro? And why should he keep a Cat from blogging politics?

WARNING: Graphic subject matter.

The preceding link takes you to a Wikipedia entry on Ishii. The information there is scant, and only linked so that you, should you choose to follow the link, will know who this man is. However, the article glosses over the fact that Ishii Shiro was a monster equalling any the world has ever known, in depth of depravity if not scope. He may not have murdered as many people as Hitler, Stalin, or Pol Pot, but that was for lack of opportunity, not intent.

For those who don't want to click the link, here are a few basic facts: Ishii Shiro was a microbiologist who joined the Japanese Imperial Army before its criminal aggressions in World War II. He was ultimately promoted to the rank of General. He started a military unit tasked with bacteriological and chemical warfare. In the course of his tenure at this unit (the infamous Unit 731), Ishii authorized and conducted experiments on living human beings, including babies. These experiments included bombing live humans, then observing their sufferings for weeks as the shrapnel from such bombs infected the test subjects with various bacteria, including plague, cholera, typhus, and the like. He authorized and performed vivisection on political prisoners and prisoners of war and unfortunate people seized for various reasons, or for no reason at all, by the Kempeitai, that group of sadists and malign misanthropes often miscalled "the Japanese military police."

Vivisection at Unit 731

Note the unfortunate subject's hands, bound, as he is being cut open while still alive and conscious.

You will ask why I chose to read about Unit 731. Quite honestly, I put off reading the book as long as I could. It was not pleasant reading. However, I highly recommend that anyone who would claim the label of pacifist, anyone who believes in non-violence, or ahimsa, anyone who opposes war, do the same.

We cannot fight a thing if we don't know what it is. Saying "war is evil" without knowing anything about war is mere bloviation.

War has been part of the human condition since the first proto-human brained his brother (literal or otherwise) with a rock as they fought over access to scarce resources.

Today our capacity to make war threatens every living thing on this planet. We could destroy our entire planet many times over, although it only needs destroying once to make the issue moot.

It bothers me that, of late, nearly every article on astronomy I read in scientific publications seems to contain the assumption that we are looking for a new home, a new planet to house our discordant species. Are we so close to the destruction of this, our home? Is there some plan afoot about which we, the labouring masses, know nothing and guess little? And, should we find it necessary to leave this planet, are we only taking with us the seeds of our future destruction?

We are still involved in two wars, in Iraq and Afghanistan. When we elected Barack Obama to the highest office in the land, he promised us that the troops would be coming home soon.

I have plenty of respect and admiration for President Obama. He's doing a great job, given the mess he inherited. But while we are drawing down troops in Iraq, and finally bringing them home; while we are closing for good that monument to the fall from grace of America The Once-Beautiful, the torture chambers of Guantanamo Bay Prison; while we have finally resolved the amorphous and overly-broad scope of the "War Against Terror" into a mission to seek and destroy Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda, his evil stepchild — I cannot but be troubled over our sending more troops to Afghanistan.

I understand that in order to safeguard itself and attain its objective, the US/NATO force currently in Afghanistan does require reinforcements. And it will be no easy task to finally clean up the mess that our Former Dear Leader Dick "they call me Dick for a reason" Cheney/Gee, Dumb? Yeah! Bouchebag and that ambulatory purulence, Donald Rumsfeld, left behind in Afghanistan.

I understand we can't just pull our military out all over the world and "bring the troops home" en masse, no matter how much we want to. We must ensure that those troops have something to come home to — jobs, or opportunities therefor, at least; the rescaling and restructuring of the military; training that will allow members of the military to do something very different than what they've been doing for the past X years. Medical issues, contract issues, benefits, all have to be managed, and with minimum disruption.

Most importantly, I believe that, although a standing army is pretty much required of any nation in this day and age, we need — we all need — to learn how to be a nation at peace. The military budget is destroying this country. We are spending millions on machines that have only one purpose: to kill or maim other human beings.

Most of us find the thought of killing and injuring other people distasteful. If we did not, there would be no need to demonize the enemy. Apparently, we don't find it distasteful enough to stop our country from becoming a vast military-industrial Moloch that grinds our own children to death in its jaws. We sacrifice the best of ourselves, our humanity, our health, our lives, and the lives of others, casually, to feed the beast. And the same people who support the burgeoning military budget complain at having to spend less than one-fifth of that amount to ensure the nation's health. (FYI: 2009 military budget: $515 billion. Estimated yearly expenditure on the public option: $90 billion annually.)

The time has come for that to end. This means we all need to learn, to see, to feel, to think, without equivocation, without flinching, about war. About exactly what it is.

And this is what it is. Torture, sadism, cruelty, inhumane acts, evil. War represents the worst in the human spirit, that allows us to justify killing old men, blowing up pregnant women, blowing limbs off little children.

Could you cut open a living human being? Dr. Ishii could. He did. He ordered his subordinates to, as well. You might say, "But I am not responsible for Dr. Ishii. This happened many years ago, and I was not even alive, at the time."

This is why you cannot plead that defense: Dr. Ishii and the scientists of Unit 731 were never prosecuted for their crimes. In return for access to their research on live human subjects — experiments forbidden by any code of ethics — Douglas MacArthur, and through him the United States of America, offered these war criminals full immunity from prosecution.

What Cheney, Bush, Rumsfeld, and their cohorts authorized in Iraq and Afghanistan bears plenty of resemblance (perhaps they didn't go as far as vivisection, although we don't yet know) to what was done by Unit 731. And these war criminals continue to walk among us, scot-free.

Here, for your delectation, some excerpts from this exceptional chronicling of Unit 731, Japan's Secret Biological Warfare in World War II, by Peter Williams and David Wallace:

The unit was referred to under a number of different names at different times: Ishii Unit; Manchuria 25202 Unit; Kwantung Army Epidemic Prevention and Water Supply Unit.

...

One of Ishii's dreams could come true — doctors in combat alongside the glorious infantry.

Doctors in combat. Those who take an oath to preserve health and life, serving alongside, and assisting, those sworn to take both health and life from anyone they, or their superiors, identify as "the enemy." Ishii set up his headquarters at P'ing Fan, in Manchuria. It was by order of the Japanese Emperor of the time, Hirohito, that the size of the detachment was fixed at 3,000 personnel.

Ever since his trip to Europe, plague had fascinated Ishii. ... Plague could create casualties often out of all proportion to the number of bacteria disseminated. Ishii deduced, therefore, that it would make an efficient weapon and set about preparing the most dangerous strains. He looked to history, to the great plagues that had ravaged continents and delighted in the chaos that such a weapon would create. ...

Plague had another advantage for Ishii. Its origins could be concealed.

...

Russians from Hogoin were only one source of human guinea pigs. Most, around 70 per cent, were Chinese soldiers, intellectuals and local worker agitators apprehended by the Kenpeitai and Secret Service throughout Manchuria.

Such human experimental material included those designated as

suspected spy, saboteur, or ideological criminal, perhaps an opium smoker, pro-Soviet and anti-Japanese, "disloyal," of no value for "enlistment," unwilling for "re-education," of no fixed abode, or simply whose release was "undesirable."

...

Unsuspecting and innocent people were also tricked into the clutches of Unit 731. Some were lured by the prospect of employment. Young boys, mothers and children, even pregnant women were trapped.

Prisoners were referred to as "maruta," which is the Japanese word for a log of wood.

Talk about dehumanization!

A maruta was just a number, a piece of experimental material. They were not even regarded as human beings.

...

The prison was a vision of hell. Through the spyhole cut in the steel doors of each cell, the plight of the chained marutas could be seen. Some had rotting limbs, bits of bone protruding through skin blackened by necrosis. Others were sweating in high fever, writhing in agony or moaning in pain. ... An infected person would be put with healthy marutas to see how easily diseases spread.

...

Marutas were "used up" at the rate of two or three per day.

Among the prisoners on whom such inhumane tests were performed were 88,000 American and Filipino PoWs captured during the fall of Bataan and Corregidor. Some of these, together with Australian, British, and New Zealand PoWs (a total of 1,485) were sent to Manchuria. How many White Russians perished at P'ing Fan is not clear. At least the Chinese and the Allies have some record of how many of their people died.

The Soviet Union prosecuted those members of Unit 731 that they captured for war crimes. They were sentenced to lengthy terms but not put to death. Eventually, they were released and repatriated to Japan. Those who evaded capture by the Soviets ended up under the military authority of the United States. In exchange for their experimental data, Douglas MacArthur and, through him, the United States Government, shielded these war criminals from prosecution, essentially giving them a free pass. Many of them went on to win high honours in their quickly-resumed professional lives.

And the U.S. government took the data from Unit 731 and conducted bacteriological warfare against the North Koreans. Uninformed Americans wonder why the North Koreans are so paranoid. In their place, wouldn't you be? Information has only now, 50+ years later, begun to surface about war crimes committed by U.S. troops in Korea. But the truth about bacterial weapons used against the Koreans is not yet common knowledge even in the U.S.

While civilian Japanese paid with their lives and health at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Ishii Shiro and his cohorts lived in comparative wealth and splendour to the end of their days. While his countrymen starved and suffered, Ishii Shiro and the commanders of Unit 731 lived well. Some of these monsters — perhaps all of them, by now — are dead. But their crimes must never die.

Chinese and Japanese protest war crimes of Unit 731

We must never forget that we human beings are capable of doing such things to each other. We invoke war as our excuse to dispel the last shreds of our humanity. It has often been said of humankind that we are "midway between angel and ape." The deeds of Unit 731 put the lie to that claim. No ape could, or would, cause such suffering to its fellow apes, and justify it so disingenuously.

In all honesty, although this book took weeks to read, and more weeks to recover from, this Cat has actually also been occupied with the monumental task of editing several books. That task is now drawing to a close, and this blog will resume its regular assault upon your consciousness.

Thank you for your attention.

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Politics: War Atrocities

Goya, War

Because, as you know, this blog is dedicated to peace, to the end of war and its atrocities, to the hope of a brighter tomorrow when we will no longer throw our children — and everyone else's — into the gaping maw of Moloch.

The combat soldier, as an absolutely deprived person, responds to direct situational exigencies. [...] Deadening fear intermingles with acts of bravery. [...]

If enemy prisoners are taken, they may be subjected to atrocities in the rage of the battle or its immediate aftermath. The soldier's distaste of endangering civilians may be overcome by his fear that [the enemy], of any age or sex, can be responsible for his own death (Ed: Or the death of those of his comrades whom he has been trained to think of as his best and only friends.) Where the opportunity arises, looting often occurs. War souvenirs are frequently collected either to be kept personally or later sold to rear-echelon servicemen. (Italics added. Editorial note from ThePoliticalCat.)

— Charles C. Moskos, as cited inMalaya and Singapore During The Japanese Occupation

The "absolutely deprived person" status that is inflicted on servicemen as part of their basic training has the effect of deadening them to all that is human and humane. Apparently, such deadening no longer has the desired effect, for even these poor, pitiful humans retain some vestige of conscience and feeling. They come back from their war crimes with PTSD, and inflict upon their loved ones, neighbours, families, and society in general, the cost of rehabilitating them and dealing with their costly and painful suffering.

Thus, our armies now seek robots, "unmanned drones," that do not, and cannot, suffer any twinge of conscience about killing the innocent, the unarmed, the civilians who are so unfortunate as to live in a zone of war.

It is stated as a matter of fact in many of the memoirs written by PoWs in the Pacific Theater during WW II that their Korean and Taiwanese guards were often more brutal and inhumane than even the Japanese soldiers, who committed unparalleled war crimes in their imperialist expansion into Southeast Asia. Upon reading at greater length of the treatment meted out to these unfortunate "Imperial subjects" of Korea and Taiwan, it becomes clear that the dehumanization process to which these unfortunate "subjects" were subjected could only be remedied or stalled by inflicting upon their helpless prisoners torments that were at least as unpleasant as those that they themselves suffered.

Thus the cycle continues. Each person one rung up on the ladder of abuse directs their kicks and blows to those one rung below. Those at the very bottom of that ladder have no one upon whom to vent their frustrations and rage, and so turn them inward and punish each other and themselves, as they have been taught and shown to do.

Picasso, Guernica

When will humanity emerge from these dark ages? When will we evolve beyond the need of war? It must come soon, or we will surely destroy ourselves and all we hold dear. Iran announced the existence of a hidden uranium-refining facility, and everywhere, the neocons have crawled out of the woodwork demanding an immediate attack upon that unfortunate nation. Why? Because the government of the State of Israel, a bunch of neocon hacks and hawks to the last man, are "afraid" of the possibility that Iran might soon have nuclear weapons. Earliest estimates of this happening range from one to five years. Not that facts should get in the way of hysteria, of course.

Israel possesses an arsenal of nuclear weapons, but will neither confirm nor deny that it does so. Israel is not a signatory to the NNPT (Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty). Iran is. Iran has notified the IAEA, as required by its membership in the IAEA, of its "secret" facility. Iran has also agreed to permit IAEA inspectors to assess its nuclear sites. Israel, not being a signatory to this, most important treaty, refuses to release any information whatsoever about what its doing with nuclear power. Israel is a hawkish state, constantly engaging in acts of hostility against its neighbours, supported by the U.S. to the tune of $10 million in taxpayer money PER DAY. In addition to obscene yearly quantities of military aid. Just this year, despite our own horrendous economic situation, we gave Israel nearly $3 billion in military aid.

The interests of the Israeli people are not being represented by their government, which prefers to use its own civilians as an excuse for further armament rather than negotiate peaceful solutions with its neighbours. Children of Abraham, of Hagar and Sarah, the time has come to beat your swords into plowshares. If you do not, then you will all be obliterated when the Third World War begins, because there are too many people who want it to begin on your doorstep. It is not a war that anyone will survive.

As Tom Lehrer sang, "We'll all go together when we go." Rather than contemplate the death of every living being on this planet, let us work together to a just solution. It can be done, if we all insist on it. Those Christian Dominionists who want Armageddon and The Rapture, do you think that teacher who said "Love thy neighbour as thyself; there is no greater commandment than [this]" would care for your efforts to create Armageddon?

Crossposted over at The Peace Tree

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Politics: Right-wing Terrorists

OMG WTF, where do they FIND these guys? Raw Story is reporting that one Wayne Simmons, a "pro-assassination CIA analyst," (fortunately now retired from the CIA) called Dick "Dick" Cheney:

“one of the most honorable men on the planet”

who would never break the law.

Are you fucking kidding me? Dick "Satan-spawn" Cheney, who has repeatedly lied to Congress, the President of the United States (his boss), and probably deity itself at this point? What the fuckin' fuck does this guy mean by honorable? A lying chickenshit chickenhawk who had "other priorities" keeping him out of the Vietnam War (five, count 'em, FIVE fucking deferments), but had no problem sending soldiers to die in a pre-emptive war in Iraq? The son-of-a-syphilitic-turtle dropped out of college as soon as he had spawned the sprog required to keep him from shedding his precious blood in foreign wars, but had no shame — none — about sending other people's sons and daughters to get killed, maimed, and permanently injured.



This is "honorable?" What dicionary is this motherfucker using?

FTA:

A story in the New York Times this past weekend, corroborated by the Washington Times on Monday, said that Cheney was aware of a secret CIA program that had been kept hidden from Congress for more than six years, and was part of the decision process to keep it from Congress — something that, if true, would be a violation of federal law.

Simmons told Fox News, “For anyone to think that Vice-President Dick Cheney would do anything illegal is nothing more than political grandstanding.”

You know, here Dick is openly and blatantly busted for violating federal law, i.e., committing a crime. And this brain-infected moron actually has the chutzpah to sit in front of a mike and say that the founding member of the Chickenhawk Brigade would never do anything illegal? Bud, is the sky blue on your planet, or is it some other colour?

Oh, wait, look, the scumsucking puke had this to write in a letter to the NYT:

“Suggesting that we intentionally misled the American people for partisan political purposes or some quid pro quo personal gain is an unconscionable attack on our honor and long service to this nation, [...].”

This, of course, was in response to an article in said paper that had exposed the fact that certain elements of the government and its agencies had "intentionally misled the American people for partisan political purposes or some quid pro quo personal gain."

I wonder if Simmons EVER served in the military? Or is he a member of the 82nd Chairborne? It seems one of the biggest problems with the military-industrial complex that Eisenhower warned against is the fact that so many "military analysts" and theoreticians never actually had to serve on the ground.

Perhaps that's why they misunderstand the meaning of common terms such as "honourable" and "illegal." Perhaps that's why they have lied and continue to lie to us about virtually everything.

I'm about to embark on some serious reading about the Vietnam War. The only way to stop war is to understand it — its roots, its beginnings, its place in the history of our individual and collective lives. We must stop people like this from poisoning the well of common discourse. If this country is to be saved intact with its honourable Constitutional roots, we must all work together, Republicans and Democrats, Liberals and Libertarians.

We cannot pretend that a government that is supposed to be "of, by, and for the people" is best served by those who would lie to us and kill our children. There is no honour in lying a trusting people into giving up their children's lives and saddling their grandchildren with debt just so that some very nasty, creepy old men can live with riches beyond what they can ever use.

Image from the Houston Press

While KBR — remember KBR? An "offshoot" of Halliburton, the company that Dick "Dick" Cheney helmed, and ran into the ground fiscally until he rescued it with no-bid contracts after finding himself the best possible candidate for VP? — was electrocuting the military in Iraq with substandard facilities and poisoning them with substandard food and water, it was using our tax dollars to buy — and throw away — people, as well as machinery, in the great swindle that we've been taught to call "Operation Enduring Freedom," or, more accurately, "This fucking hideous unprovoked war in Iraq."

That last link is to a Rolling Stone story about an ex-military man who went to Iraq as a civilian contractor and got seriously fucked up, so if you have a sensitive stomach, you might not care to read it. Alternatively, if you're, like, contemplating eating or anything like that, don't click any of the links about the poisoned food and water. I think I just gave up eating permanently. Jesus, what vomitous little shitbags like Dick Cheney and Wayne Simmons have done, and are doing to the military is enough to make you puke blood.

Those of you who are into that kind of thing might wish to let Faux Noise know that you don't approve of Mr. Simmons' somewhat cavalier interpretations of polysyllabi like "honour" and "illegal," and such. It appears words of one syllable are more his speed. Mr. Simmons also believes in assassinating foreign leaders. Something tells me the Founding Fathers would have happily given him a trial for such undemocratic beliefs, which would have surely led to a justified firsthand experience of execution, since they did not believe in assassination. What a walking enema!!

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Politics: War Crimes

When do these war criminals go to trial?
As we've mentioned before, a Class A war criminal is anyone who participated in "the planning, preparation, initiation, or waging" of aggressive war, or violated the laws and customs of war. Like, for example, the Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War. Which Convention would certainly apply to Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, Jay Bybee, John Yoo, and possibly also David Addington, Condoleeza Rice, George Dumbya Bush, and a score of their immediate underlings, highly placed officials all.

Today, I'm reading a fine book on the Kempeitai and their crimes in the Pacific Theatre of World War II, by Raymond Lamont-Brown. Mr. Lamont-Brown's father was a PoW, captured by the Japanese in Shanghai, China, and subjected to the tender ministries of the Kempeitai, who, as brutal torturers go, might rank higher than any other similar body heretofore known.



Here, a little excerpt for your — I can't say entertainment, it certainly isn't entertaining — perusal:

You are a man of education, of intelligence, even in a sense of culture. Yours is the cunning brain under whose direction your instruments of torture performed their evil task. You were well aware of all the moral implications of your policy. In these last six weary years many men have willingly suffered and died in the hope and belief that out of their sacrifice would arise a higher morality in dealings of one nation with another, an international morality soaring above the narrow bonds of patriotism and blind obedience. If, as I believe, some of your victims, Sumida, were amongst those who made their sacrifice in that hope and belief, let this be their epitaph, that they died for an undying cause. To those of us who survive falls the supreme and difficult task of establishing and maintaining that higher morality between nations, of supplanting the rule of force and fear by the rule of law, of ensuring that they did not make their sacrifice in vain.

You, Sumida, have shown by all that you did, ordered, and willingly allowed, that to you there is nothing of higher consequence than domination by brute force and fear.

You were prepared, for the glorification, as you thought, of your country, to reduce men and women below the level of beasts and to send them without pity or compunction to an agonizing death. You did not realize that your actions have not glorified, they have degraded, your country. As in the past, so in the future, you would always be the implacable enemy of that great cause for which so many made their sacrifice. You and men like you cannot be allowed to hinder the fulfilment of that cause. Accordingly it is in no spirit of vengeance upon a fallen foe, no desire to have an eye for an eye, a life for a life, that this Court has solemnly decided that you must die. Nor is it merely to rid the world — and your country now preparing for its moral rebirth — of one man who is a danger to all moral progress. Rather it is a stern example to all who would willingly support the powers of evil and brute force against the rule of law, justice, and humanity.

— Lt.-Col S.C. Silkin, R.A., barrister, at War Crimes Trial of Chusa Haruzo Sumida, Supreme Court Building, Singapore, 18 March 1946

It is my sincere and heartfelt hope to hear words of similar import being spoken one day soon at the trial of those who "planned, prepared, initiated, or waged" the war of aggression against Iraq which is only now winding down.

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No Shortage of Teh Stupid

Apparently, the Wah!Poo (aka the Washington Post) has decided to fire Dan Froomkin, one of the best journalists I've found over the past decade or so. To add salt to the wound, they decided to give Paul "Wolfie" Wolfowitz, that neocon hustler schmuck, proven liar, and known war criminal, a guest column this weekend, probably with intent to hire.

What's really interesting about the firing of Froomkin and the hosting of Wolfie is how many people have had a strong reaction thereto. I was very upset and depressed about it yesterday, but after visiting their ombudsidiot's bleagh (just like a blog, only stupider and more pointless) today, found what seemed like at least one thousand angry comments, many from subscribers who've taken the Wah!Poo for decades and swear they will no more.

Whatever. I wrote Dan a thankyou for his terrific work — some days it seemed like he was the only thread of sanity, during the horrible Bush years. And then, because I couldn't resist, I went to the ombudsidiot's bleagh and added a dollop of snark along these lines:

I left here yesterday determined never to return, but was intrigued by a link in a blog I read regularly about the "700 comments" on the firing of Froomkin. I'm glad I swung by for a quick look. It seems as if the number of comments on this page is now a thousand or more. And many, many people share my sentiments about the inappropriateness of, on the one hand, firing Froomkin who exercised true journalistic even-handedness in speaking truth to power, and, on the other, giving column space to yet another tired neocon war criminal and known liar, Wolfowitz. And now that Jane Hamsher has the stats on Wah!Poo readership, it looks as if The Huffington Post is not just drinking your milkshake, but eating your lunch as well. Shoot, it's even sweeping up all the crumbs for later dispersal to the birds. I admired and respected the Washington Post of Katie Graham, although I never agreed with its politics. It was a good paper, though, and earned its laurels. What Fred Hiatt and the Graham scion have done with it leaves it barely fit for fishwrap. Goodbye again, Wah!Poo. Judging from the figures, you'll soon be part of teh Moonie Times anyway.

Feel free to express your wrath, if any, here. If you want to say goodbye to Dan, you'll find him here for another week or so. He's promised to let his readership know where he'll land, and land he will, gracefully, on both feet. It's the Wah!Poo's loss, not his. Their current stable of Op-Ed writers (and stable is an apt term, given the horses' asses they house) includes such non-luminaries as Charles Krauthammer (vile, spittle-flecked, reality-insensible torture-loving neocon); Ramesh Ponnuru (the less said the better); Bill Kristol (fired by the NYT for a tragic divorce from fact); George Will ("teh global warming of my blue jeans, it is teh drama"); and David "You peasants don't need to know that the X industry paid me to tell you Y" Broder; and, who knows, Rush Limbaugh next, unless Wolfie takes the job.

In the meantime, you can find Dan's writing at Nieman Watchdog. If you're a regular reader of Glenn Greenwald's blog at Salon, or any of the big blogs like Firedoglake, HuffPo, Daily Kos, TPM, and the like, there's plenty of lively discussion going on about the issue. Is the Wah!Poo circling the toilet, or already in teh shit?

Mainly, what I'm wondering is, would it be worthwhile to subscribe to the Wah!Poo just to cancel one's subscription on the day Dan leaves? You know, just to really drive home the point that lotsa lotsa people think they're truly well beyond fucked up and, as Molly Ivins used to say, not being driven out of business by the Internet so much as committing suicide like a drunken lemming on crack. But I paraphrase.

Whatever. There isn't room for two reactionary birdcage liners in the city of Washington, D.C., so chances are they're, as some commenter said on Sadly, No!, presenting like a female mandrill in heat in the hope of being acquired by the true neocon schmatta, the Washington Times, affectionately (no, sorry, truthfully, rather) known as The Moonie Times.

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Economy: Imagine

ICHC

Losing your house over a bill for a lousy fifty bucks. That's what happened to Jean Castro of Connecticut, who emigrated from Haiti many years ago. He's saved all his life to buy this house. (Note: he also owns the house next door.) Is he a deadbeat who refused to pay taxes? No, he's apparently always paid his property tax bills in full. However, the city of Bridgeport, where Mr. Castro lives, claims that Mr. Castro has run up various bills with the city before and refused to pay. On further examination, it turns out that the city sent the property tax bills to Mr. Castro, and he forwarded them to his mortgage company, which was supposed to pay them. The total bill was around $3,000 but most of that was for attorney's fees. The actual tax bill was a little over $50.00.

I used to have an arrangement like that with my bank. The city persisted in sending the bills to me, although I repeatedly (and often irately) notified them that the bills were to be sent directly to the bank, which was paying the taxes out of the adjusted mortgage amount that I paid monthly (they calculated the property tax plus mortgage and then billed me monthly for the sum including "a little something" for their trouble.) I finally terminated the arrangement because it was cheaper and less troublesome to pay the property taxes myself. So my sympathies are with Mr. Castro, of course.

I have no idea how efficient the city of Bridgeport is, but if they're anything at all like my city, they need to rethink their position on this. Taking someone's home because they were late paying a lousy $50.00 is ludicrous. As for the summons they claim they sent him, pish, posh, and piffle. $2,700 in attorneys' fees over a fifty-dollar debt? Puh-leez. The fact that the bank paid the bill indicates that someone screwed up here and that someone is not Mr. Castro. Chances are, like my bank, they delayed paying the bill and, in fact, delayed doing anything at all about it until caught flatfooted, and then paid to have the matter swept under the rug. It IS Countrywide Bank, after all, and their El Jefe is currently facing charges from the SEC, so who knows what can of worms this might open?

HuffPo reports that the March disbursement of Treasury monies called the "homeowners bailout is beginning to show some positive signs. They promise to keep an eye on the issue. We should all keep an eye on the issue. I'm still overwhelmed by negative feelings about the bank bailout, as the above picture clearly shows. I know it was necessary (and there I disagree with most of my good friends and fellow bloggers who have whupped me upside the head for such statements, but Your Cat Is A Stubborn Cat, and I plough on). The current financial crisis seems to be easing, and even Paul Krugman says so. Other countries are having differing degrees of fiscal troubles, but all the economies who could afford it (and even some who couldn't) have poured money into their troubled banks to shore them up. It could have been much worse.



Goodness knows the Bushies probably intended it to be, taking billions in loans from China to prosecute an endless and unjustified war.

And speaking of war, I'm currently reading a history of modern Japan (from the Tokugawa Shogunate through the 1980s), and came across these words of wisdom regarding World War II:

The International Military Tribunal for the Far East was created for the purpose of trying the political leaders who were responsible for "crimes against peace." [...] war criminals were charged with "the planning, preparation, initiation, or waging" of aggressive war. Most of these men were also tried for violations of the laws and customs of war [...].

Wouldn't that accurately describe the Bush Administration? They declared war against Iraq before the UN's weapons inspectors had finished their task. Subsequently, American inspectors announced that they had failed to discover the "weapons of mass destruction" that purportedly formed the basis for an uninvited and unprovoked war of aggression against a sovereign nation.

So, why exactly are we not trying these sons of illegitimate drunken toads-in-a-ditch for war crimes? Or is that reserved only for non-Americans? I think it would be a delicious irony indeed if Japan, Germany, and Italy would band together to create a war crimes tribunal for teh Bushies. OTOH, that would probably cause mass hysteria (I only find it amusing because of my deeply cynical nature). So perhaps it's just as well that the effort appears to span all continents and nationalities save this one.

Hint: Drop your fucking congresscritters yet another note urging them to move on war crimes. Sheldon Whitehouse (yay, Senator!) is hinting that torture investigations might well encompass the war criminals at the top.

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Politics: Your Happy News For Teh Day

According to the New Yorker, in a recent article titled "The Bush Six," by Jane Mayer, war crimes trials for some of the criminals in the previous administration might be available sooner than we think. The lucky ducks who could qualify for an intimate view of the Hague and matching cool orange-stripey gear include our old friends Dough Feith (no typo, aka "the fucking stupidest guy on the face of the earth," General Tommy Franks, see Woodward, Plan of Attack); John Yoo, who coined the term "enhanced interrogation techniques" as a substitute for what honest people call "torture"; David Addington, Snarl Cheney's secretive legal counsel and right-claw shadow; and Alberto Gonezales, the second fucking stupidest guy on the face of the earth, aka, "I Don't Recall." Undoubtedly, the two others are Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney.

What you will find heartening about this report is reproduced here for your enjoyment:

[...] Gonzalo Boye, the Chilean-born Spanish lawyer [...] last week filed the criminal complaint against the Bush officials, on behalf of five former prisoners who were, they allege, tortured in the U.S. military prison at Guantánamo Bay.

It is hard to predict what will happen next, but, if arrest warrants are issued, the Obama Administration may be forced either to extradite the former officials or to start its own investigation. Sands, who admires Obama, said, “I regret that I have added to his in-box when he has so much else to sort out. But I hope he does the right thing. There’s not much dispute anymore: torture happened, and the law is clear—torture must be punished.”

Meanwhile, Sands reiterated a warning that he made in his book. “If I were they,” he said, referring to the former officials in question, “I would think carefully before setting foot outside the United States. They are now, and forever in the future, at risk of arrest. Until this is sorted out, they are in their own legal black hole.”

Admittedly, we don't know if warrants will be issued, or if these lowlife thugs will be arrested and tried and forced to serve their time. But think of it this way. From the day Philippe Sands' expose was first published to the day they die, these swine will, every single day of their lives, wake up wondering if today is the day they get schlepped before the court.

If you've ever been involved in a court case, even when you're the innocent party or the plaintiff, you know how stressful it is. Every single day until the day they're in the pokey, if ever, these schmucks will be looking behind them, waiting for the hand on the shoulder. Every piece of mail, every phone call, every knock on the door, every invitation that requires them to travel outside the continental United States will be a source of fear and trepidation and unease. May their ulcers eat them alive.

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Entertainment? Say WHAT?

Given that we just commemorated the anniversary of the Jewish Uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto (April 19th), I, personally, find these lying mealy-mouthed fuckheads from Fux News and their ex-Bushwa friends too fucking hard to take. Apparently, Jon Stewart does too.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	M - Th 11p / 10c
We Don't Torture
thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Economic Crisis Political Humor

Look, you pitiful, hypocritical, butt-sucking, rump-swabbing, anal-poisoned (thanks Flush Rimbowl), yam-sniffing (thanks, Maru!) detritus off a devil's hoof, I realize full well that you don't have the first clue about what comprises ethics, honour, morals, righteousness, good, truth, justice, and what-all. But when you trot out Darth Cheney from whatever pit of evil he frequents to frolic about yawping about how he thinks he and his comrades-in-evil have nothing to apologize for, well, then, you pathetic wastes of air, it's time for a dozen or more resounding thwacks with the trademarked La Casa de Los Gatos' Golden Bat o'Clue:



Dick, here's a list of my wishes for you:

• May you die soon in excruciating agony a thousand times worse than any of the tortures your minions inflicted on people;
  
• Until you die, may you develop some hitherto unknown ailment that causes you agony a thousand times, et cetera, ad infinitum, ad nauseam, see previous item.
  
• May you go down in infamy for all time so that no creature ever mentions your name again without appending to it the descriptors of "torturer, murderer, liar, vermin, unethical swine, profiteer, dirtbag, Satan'spawn, whoreson," and the like ad infinitum;
  
• May you never know another night's peaceful sleep from this day forward;
  
• May all living creatures shun your touch and turn away from you, including your own family;
  
• May you be haunted by the voices and faces of those who have died and suffered because of your acts, direct or indirect, and your omissions;
  
• May death become sweet release for you, to be desired with all your energy, and may it elude you until life is nothing but pain and torture, to the same extent that you made others' lives pain and torture.

You vile scum of worthless protoplasm, more evil than the world has ever known, may no medicine alleviate an instant of all the pain I wish on you.

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Politics: Who Knew Condi Was So Popular

with our friends in New Zealand?

Banner reads "War Criminal Wish You Weren't Here"

Not a single major media outlet in the U.S. reported on this enchanting display of respect and affection for our Esteemed ChevronTanker-in-Chief, Condoleeza Rice. Even as our Saudi Arabian Overlords were showering Bootsie Ferragamo with expensive jewels — $316,000 worth of them, which our bootlickers in the professional media are describing as "Foreigners take(ing) a shine to" Rice — not a single one of them bothered to report that students in NZ had put a price on Rice's head.

Auckland University Students Association had to withdraw the bounty it placed on the head of Condoleezza Rice two days earlier, under threat of legal action. However, the students association at Victoria University in Wellington doubled the price, offering $10,000 for a successful citizen's arrest. Although several people turned up to the demo with handcuffs, the chance to nab Rice didn't present itself. Police refused to cooperate in the arrest of this war criminal, giving the irrelevant excuse that she is a visiting dignitary.

Much more newsworthy in my opinion. The degree to which our media shapes the information we receive is not lost upon the hoi polloi, you media jackals. There's a reason your circulation is dropping faster than Bush's approval rates (or lack thereof).

A third of a million dollars worth of jewelry gifted to the Secretary of State. Doesn't that look — and smell — bad? As one more famous than our humble self would say, "It stinks in my nostrils." Didn't anyone tell you, Condi, that Caesar's wife must be above suspicion?

Fortunately, our laws say that Condi can't keep the glitter for herself. It's all been turned over to the GSA, along with the mere $100,000 or so of gifts these same people gave to Boosh. It does make you wonder why these wealthy monarchs would give such expensive gifts to the Shoe Queen, though, doesn't it?

From the New Zealand Protest

Thanks, New Zealanders, for showing us what we should have been doing from the first moment this warmongering lunatic began spouting her bullshit about war and torture and Terra. Thanks for standing up for human rights and human(e) conscience.

Photographs of this fine event are available at this link.

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Bush Ducks Shoes: You've been messin' where you shouldn't have been a messin' ...

These Boots Were Made For Walking

You keep saying you've got something for me.
something you call love, but confess.
You've been messin' where you shouldn't have been a messin'
and now someone else is gettin' all your best.

These boots are made for walking, and that's just what they'll do
one of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you.

You keep lying, when you oughta be truthin'
and you keep losin' when you oughta not bet.
You keep samin' when you oughta be changin'.
Now what's right is right, but you ain't been right yet.

These boots are made for walking, and that's just what they'll do
one of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you.

You keep playin' where you shouldn't be playin
and you keep thinkin' that you´ll never get burnt.
Ha! I just found me a brand new box of matches yeah
and what he know you ain't HAD time to learn.

Are you ready boots? Start walkin'!



Ms. Manitoba: It's hard work being a war criminal.

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The Countdown Clock

Man, those seconds just can't run out fast enough for me. Or any other of my fine fellow bloggers. The remaining denizens of La Casa de Los Gatos don't seem to care as long as they get their 18 hours of shuteye per day, interspersed with fine kibble, treats, toys, pets, catnip, and the daily constitutional exploration of the hillside, but.


Me, I can't bear waking up to a headline such as this:

Bush 'very pleased' with Iraq war outcome: Report

Is there anything that bothers this pathetic, revolting little man? Does he think for even one minute of the nearly 5,000 coffins in which the remains of his fellow-citizens lie moldering? The tears of their parents? Their spouses and children? The suffering their families and friends endure, having lost a loved one? The estimated 50,000 or so lying in their own piss in military hospitals or suffering quietly at home? Missing a limb or an organ, struggling to get along on disability payments, homeless? Doomed to a lifetime of fighting the mental and emotional impact of what has been seen and lived through?


And what of the Iraqis who have died by the hundreds of thousands? Does he ever think about, see, respond to, the sight of a pool of blood blackening in the desert sun? Filled with the limbs, separated from their erstwhile owners, of children, housewives, cab-drivers, innocent bystanders, stallholders in the marketplace where the latest atrocity occurred? A little more than two years ago, a Lancet study estimated the number of Iraqi dead at 655,000. UNHCR estimates 4.7 million refugees, both inside and outside Iraq, most in dire need of food, shelter, medical aid.

Does the monster-in-chief ever contemplate the children who have seen their parents blown up before their eyes, the fathers who have no jobs but still must feed their children, the mother whose child burned and stuck to her body when our troops opened fire on her car?


Because, in addition to that first heart-wracking headline, in fact, almost immediately below it, I notice this:

Baghdad blasts kill 19

The Green Zone blast splashed blood and seared flesh across the grey concrete barriers at the entrance, according to an AFP correspondent.

Meanwhile, the rotten thing that wears the mantle of this country's leader announced today that he

believes the Iraq war was a success and is "very pleased" with what is happening there.

[He added] ..."remarkable" progress had been made in Iraq since the late dictator [Saddam Hussein] was toppled in 2003.

"People have been able to take their troops out of Iraq because Iraq is becoming successful. I'm very pleased with what is taking place there now," he said, adding there still is "a lot of work" to be done.

"We are bringing troops home because of the success in Iraq. But Iraq is not yet completely safe.

"So there will be a US presence for a while there at the request of the Iraqi government," he said.

"The United States is willing to continue to help. Most countries there within a very broad coalition have come home but we want to help this government," he said without further elaborating.

Of course, without further elaborating. Either he's lying through his teeth or he, as usual, doesn't have the first fucking clue what he's talking about. He doesn't elaborate on his statements because someone, some very malevolent wretch in the bowels of this misadministration, writes these deliberately disingenuous things for him to say, and he parrots them as his "handlers" tell him to. He has nothing to say about the armless, the legless, the blind and insane, those proud wounded heroes of his money-burning war that is crashing and burning our economy around our ears. Jesus, what a fucking blind, limited, self-satisfied pig he is. A thousand, no, a million curses on his empty head.

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Politics: Goodbye To The Old

Yep, it had to happen. Some enterprising person has put up a site where YOU can leave a goodbye message to your soon-to-be-ex preznitwit.

Image from the fine folks at BuckFush


Go leave a message, if you want. Or entertain yourself by reading the messages others have left. Needless to say, there isn't a single message (so far) expressing regret that the Failure-in-Chief is leaving.

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Politics: Satan Indicted

Well, well, well. Strike me down with a feather. Or paint me pink and call me a Cadillac. Or something.



The Dallas Morning News is reporting that Richard "Satan" Bruce Cheney, the current Vice-President of this fine nation, has been indicted by a South Texas grand jury

" ... on charges related to the alleged abuse of prisoners in Willacy County's federal detention centers."

The story goes on to explain on exactly what grounds Satan was indicted. See, apparently Dickie Boy owns a stake in the Vanguard Group

" ... which holds interests in the private prison companies running the federal detention centers. It accuses Cheney of a conflict of interest and 'at least misdemeanor assaults' on detainees by working through the prison companies."

Remember when we blogged about the prison-industrial complex in this country? This country which has imprisoned approximately one per cent of its total population? How that job of imprisoning the working poor had then been outsourced to private industry which was charging taxpayers a hefty fee for "taking care" of our unfortunate fellow-citizens even as it exploited their labour and used it to drive down the wages of the working poor further?

Well, it looks as if some prosecutor has finally discovered a pair of cojones lying around and clapped them on. Oh, yeah, and we forgot to mention that Alberto Gonezales was also indicted, on the grounds that he had stopped an investigation into the abuses going on in these detention centers.

Hallelujah. Will wonders never cease?

La Casa de Los Gatos recommends a glass or two of the spirits of your choice in celebration. Will Al and Satan's Dick actually make it into a prison? With orange jumpsuits and leg shackles? Will they be making our license plates?


Oh, frabjous day, callooh callay, he chortled in his joy. (Thanks, Lewis Carroll!)

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2008 Elections: The Real Analysis

Nobody does it better than Jon Stewart. The idea of putting clips of politicians making contradictory statements side by side allows viewers to form their own fact-based opinions on the lying scumbaggery of these lying scumbags:



Who the hell wants arch war-criminal and thug Karl Rove opining on the future of the country, is what we would like to know. Shouldn't he be in a jail cell somewhere? In an orange jumpsuit?

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Hurricane Katrina

Photo courtesy of The Chicago Tribune

This entire week has been spent worrying for our friends in NOLA and Louisiana in general and all the other good people who live on the Gulf Coast. Gustav is now a Category 4 hurricane, and given the last horrible fiasco, we are on tenterhooks.

For a beautiful (and sad) photo memorial of Katrina, please drop by Gilbert Mercier's blog. The man has both the photographer's eye and a wonderfully developed sense of irony.

We hear the Republicans might reschedule their convention. They claim it's because of Hurricane Gustav, but we greatly doubt that. Those mean motherfuckers couldn't give a shit about New Orleans, and more specifically, poor black (or any other shade in the fucking rainbow) Democratic voters in New Orleans. We secretly suspect they're postponing because so many Reputzlicans have weaseled out of attending that it'll be a gigantoflop.

Of course, Nero II is babbling about how "better days" lie ahead. We assume his poorly developed sense of irony does not permit him to realize that the "better days" the whole world is looking forward to are the days after he leaves office, hopefully in chains, hopefully for the Hague. Hopefully, his good buddy Johnny MacNuts will be eating cake in one of his many mansions, but NOT the one in which we seat our President.

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World: South Ossetia In Graphics

Found these on a Russian site (who knows? We don't read Cyrillic):


The short version of what happened in South Ossetia/Georgia.



Remember when Emperor Jor Jee told us this?



The Biblical version.

Today Emperor Jor Jee accused the Russians of "bullying" Georgia. Is he fucking shitting us? How, like, irony-deficient do you have to be to even open your festering gob on this issue? HULLO? Earth to Chimpius Tardibus!

Iraq was severely damaged by the first Gulf War, the long war with Iran, and the decade-long embargo finally lifted in 2003 (by Resolution 1483 in the UN). Iraq had nothing at all to do with the events of 9/11. In fact, there was so little evidence linking Iraq to any possible action against the US that the Dick who has his hand up Li'l Boots Teh Glove Puppet's arse had to order a forged letter to create the excuse to take us to war. Iraq, after years of war and embargo, had hardly any army worth mentioning. Iraq was much too far away to make invasion or attack easy.

Georgia, on the other hand, shares a border with Russia. Georgia's nascent military was being armed, outfitted, and trained by U.S. military and Israeli advisors. Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili has recently lost almost half his countrymen's support he originally enjoyed when he took power. Georgia's Minister of Defense is an Israeli citizen.

South Ossetia has been an autonomous region (as has Abkhazia) since the days of Imperial Russia. It joined Georgia during the Russian Revolution because it (unlike North Ossetia) supported the Mensheviks. However, it is not, and has never been, part of Georgia. Although intermarriage is common, South Ossetians are a distinct community, ethnically, politically, and religiously, with strong affinity with their Russian neighbour. South Ossetians hold Russian passports, although they speak their own language (Ossetic, an Indo-Aryan language related to Iranian).

So, when Georgia attacked South Ossetia, Russia responded to defend its citizens (and, undoubtedly, to kick Saakashvili's ass around the field as a message to other nations in its "sphere of influence" that they'd better not mess with The Bear).

The Israeli military advisors who were training the Georgian army were amazed at Saakashvili's decision to tangle with South Ossetia. He has made a disastrous mess of things, and is responsible for the deaths of all the South Ossetians and Georgians in this conflict. He really should be taken in chains to the Hague and charged with war crimes. Unfortunately, stupidity is not a crime, or that could be added to the count as well. Ha'aretz is quite blunt in its assessment of the situation:

Saakashvili's statements are part of his government's attempt to bring other countries into its war against Russia. During the briefing, Saakashvili noted that he is in constant contact with U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. He promised that U.S. warships would be docking in Georgian ports within a few days to make sure they remain open.

Apparently, the Pentagon has different ideas.

"We do not need nor do we intend to take over any air or seaports in order to deliver humanitarian assistance to those caught in this conflict," said Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell on Wednesday.

If it wasn't obvious before, it clearly is now. Saakashvili is doing his best to drag other countries, beginning with the US, into his war. Someone needs to take him out to the barn and administer six or ten of the best with the Golden Bat o'Clue(tm). His situpon should be rendered unsittable-upon for a few weeks. How dare he presume to get not just his own countrymen but total strangers killed for the sake of his ego? Who does he think he is, George Bush?

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World: What Really Happened In South Ossetia? Part II

We closed the first part of this lengthy post on the situation in South Ossetia with the denunciation of Mikheil Saakashvili. We didn't give a list of reasons why we thought Saakashvili was worthy of such denunciation. We will do so right after including this comment from allencharles, who said, in response to Part I:

Some history of the area needs to be presented to if my comment is to be understood.

The South Ossetian Autonomous Oblast was established in 1922 by the U.S.S.R. and remained a part of the U.S.S.R. inside Georgia until it (presumably the USSR) failed. The new Georgian government declared their (the South Ossetian) government as illegal and took away the freedoms the Ossetians had lived under since 1922. They Ossetians refused to accept the loss of their local government and have been in rebellion until the present. Over 90 percent of the Ossetians are duel citizens of both Georgia and Russia. One way of understanding their local government would be to compare an American Indian Nation and the US Government.

When the army of Georgia decided to attack and kill every Ossetian the Russian’s moved in to stop it. THEY HAD ALREADY KILLED 1,400 Ossetians. This has been confirmed by multiple news sources. We refer you to Teh Google.

This is where we find the situation today. When the Serbs attempted to wipe out the Arimeans in Kosvo, America did exactly the same thing to stop them and we bombed Serbia.

You can think for yourselves as to whether or not Bush is in order with his comments to Russia.

The people of Kosvo were not American citizens yet we felt a moral duty to protect them. If 1,400 American Citizens had been murdered just south of our boarder what to you think we would have done?

Well, I think we showed exactly what we would have done when Reagan sent the army to the tiny nation of Grenada simply because there were students with American nationality in that nation when they had their revolution. Of course, it was an excuse to wipe out the progressive movement there, even though no Americans were actually harmed. We notice that Bush isn't rattling quite so many sabers at China despite the recent murder of an American citizen there. Our guess is, it's easier to conduct "regime change" on small, poorly armed countries than on some people who outnumber you four times AND to whom you owe a ton of money for financing your last war.

But, to continue. Essentially, South Ossetia has been autonomous since the 1920s. When Georgia attempted to take over, the South Ossetians resisted and have continued resisting to the present. In the 1990s, South Ossetia expelled the Georgian army from its territory, but Saakashvili and the Georgian government have refused to recognize South Ossetia's claims to autonomy and continue to treat the region as part of Georgia, despite the South Ossetians' lengthy history as a separate ethnic and linguistic group. Dr. Gerard Toal, professor of Government and International Affairs at Virginia Tech's Washington, D.C., campus offers a nuanced look at the situation in an article at The Irish Times.

In 2002, U.S. military advisors were seconded to Georgia, where they have purportedly been training the Georgian military in the "war against terror," which is starting to look markedly like an excuse for global hegemony. One which, it hardly need be pointed out, is untenably expensive for American taxpayers and the U.S. military, which is currently fighting a "war" on two fronts — Iraq and Afghanistan. All pretense of finding Usama bin Laden or the perpetrators of the 2001 attack on U.S. soil has long since been abandoned.

Wikipedia tells us that in 2006, a second referendum on the autonomy of South Ossetia was held, the first (in 1992) having been deemed invalid by other nations.

According to the Tskhinvali election authorities, the referendum turned out a majority for independence from Georgia where 99% of South Ossetian voters supported independence and the turnout for the vote was 95% and the referendum was monitored by a team of 34 international observers from Germany, Austria, Poland, Sweden and other countries at 78 polling stations. However, it was not recognized internationally by the UN, European Union, OSCE, NATO and the Russian Federation, given the lack of ethnic Georgian participation and the legality of such referendum without recognition from the central government in Tbilisi.

Once again, the South Ossetians were not recognized as having a right to autonomy and sovereignty, even though the inhabitants of the tiny enclave of Kosovo within Serbia were granted such autonomy. This is sheer hypocrisy.

The following year (2007), the Georgian government appeared to lend greater credence to South Ossetia's claims of autonomy. Essentially, the region of South Ossetia had, by this time, been behaving as an autonomous state for over 15 years (since the referendum of 1992 and the Dagomys ceasefire agreement of that year) if not longer (since the 1920s).

In the intervening years, Saakashvili, an American-educated Georgian, had been cultivating American neocons and was getting particularly cosy with that spectacular human failure, George "Dumbya" Bush, who hailed him as a "liberator" — sort of like the Iraqis did with us — in this particularly ironic speech, delivered in Tsibili:

Georgia is "building a democratic society where the rights of minorities are respected; where a free press flourishes; where a vigorous opposition is welcomed and where unity is achieved through peace," he said.

Saakashvili, whom honest taxpaying Americans might term "a kiss-ass," showed his gratitude with this particular lickspittlery:

Saakashvili praised Bush as a "decisive and visionary leader," [...]

Oh, indeedy. The only way you could refer to Jor Jee as visionary is if you were describing what he sees in his drunken or drugged stupors. But we digress.

In the meantime, the blessed recipients of the freedom and liberty promised by Saakashvili had found that they were enjoying precious little of either. As is the wont of free and liberated citizens of democratic societies, they took to the streets in peaceful protest — much like the Rose Revolution that brought Saakashvili to power. Imagine their surprise when the democratic liberator of Georgia, instead of welcoming their "vigorous opposition," proceeded to turn riot police with rubber bullets, hoses, tear gas, and water cannons on them. He added insult to injury by imposing a 15-day state of emergency in which Interior Ministry troops armed with truncheons patrolled the streets. He suspended news services and banned all demonstrations.

Remarkably democratic, ain't it? Some 500 were injured, approximately 100 of them seriously enough to require hospitalization, and many were jailed and tortured.

Saakashvili's popularity was on the wane. In response to pressure from opposition forces, he held snap elections in January of this year (2008) and won with a mere 52 per cent of the vote — a significant come-down from his first election, which he won with nearly 96 per cent. Meanwhile, Saakashvili is doing his best to get Georgia into the EU and NATO. The Europeans have been relatively cool to the idea, but American neocons, who have tricked American citizens into foolish and costly wars repeatedly, have no such compunctions.

Saakashvili's machinations behind the scenes aside, the little dictator is in a dangerous position. He is trying to draw the U.S. and Europe into a war with Russia — a war which no one will win. Vladimir Putin is an ex-KGB man and nobody's fool. And unfortunately, the U.S. is currently in the hands of the biggest fool to ever walk the planet. Now we come to the events of this week.

Saakashvili concluded a ceasefire agreement, that included Russian-mediated negotiations, with South Ossetian leader Eduard Kokoity on Thursday, August 7th 2008.

At 2200 hours (South Ossetian time) on that same day, as the rest of the world was preparing to watch the Olympic games, Georgia invaded South Ossetia in a surprise attack. These allegations are made by South Ossetians and have been confirmed by no less an authority than Aunty Beeb. Georgian tanks were soon rolling into South Ossetia's capital, Tskhinvali. For the next day and night, the Georgian military attacked South Ossetia, bombing, shelling, destroying houses, targeting hospitals, and indiscriminately killing civilians. The current estimate is that between 1,400 and 2,000 civilians were killed. The Mail reports that 30,000 fled the city of Tskhinvali, looking for refuge in Russian North Ossetia. Georgian authorities were making statements such as this:

The Georgian Minister for Integration, Temur Yakobashvili, said Georgia's aim was not to take over the territory but to finish "a criminal regime".

[...]

In a televised address, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili earlier called for the bloodshed to end, but also warned the Russian-backed separatists not to try Tbilisi's patience.

This can only be deemed provocative. A criminal regime? To be finished? Is he referring to Kokoity, who his fellow South Ossetians consider their leader? Tiny Georgia warning the Russian bear not to try their patience?

On Friday, 8th August 2008, Russia requested an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council. It offered an immediate halt to violence in South Ossetia on the condition that both parties renounce the use of armed force. Mark Ames, writing in The Nation, says that Saakashvili refused to renounce armed force. Al Jazeera confirms this. Meanwhile, Georgian military forces continued to bomb civilian targets and reduce buildings to rubble. All the while, Saakashvili, in a display of hubris heretofore unequaled, continued to rail at the Russians and the South Ossetians. Russian response was swift and merciless.


Later that same day, Russian planes and tanks entered South Ossetia, sweeping the terrified Georgian army before them and halting the indiscriminate attempts at genocide by Georgian forces. The Georgian military abandoned the town of Gori, birthplace of Georgia's most famous son Josef Stalin, without firing a single shot.

By Sunday, August 10th, Russian troops having cleared South Ossetia of the Georgian military presence then proceeded to cut roads and bomb a military airfield in Georgian territory, although the Georgians claim they also hit the airport in Tbilisi, capital of Georgia. Russian warships had also deployed to the coast of the Black Sea, where the Georgians claimed they were blockading food and fuel supplies. The Russians replied that they were not interested in a blockade but had a right to search all ships in the region.

Saakashvili then proclaimed a unilateral ceasefire and urged the Russians to respect this. Meanwhile, Georgian military forces continued to attack civilian populations in South Ossetia. Russia pointed this fact out in refusing to accept the ceasefire. Meanwhile, Georgian troops were advancing on Abkhazia. Russia warned Georgia to pull back and when Georgia failed to do so, advanced deep into Georgian territory from the Abkhazian side of the border after first evicting any remaining Georgian military from Abkhazia (which has its own long-running dispute with Georgia about autonomy; many Abkhazians hold Russian citizenship).

European diplomats have met with Saakashvili in Tbilisi — which does sort of put the lie to Saakashvili's claims that the Russians are bombing Tbilisi, doesn't it? — to persuade him to sign a ceasefire agreement.

Presently, the situation stands like this. Nicolas Sarkozy of France has met with Dmitry Medvedev of Russia to discuss the ceasefire. Medvedev has announced the end of Russian operations in the region. Georgia has yet to respond. A final settlement discussion is expected to occur soon.

There are rumours that Russian peacekeepers were killed by Israeli troops operating on Georgian soil. However, Ha'aretz is reporting that all Israeli security personnel who were training Georgian troops left before the war took place.

A retired senior Israeli officer who recently trained troops in Georgia said yesterday he was surprised that the Georgians faced off against Russia, since they have a much smaller army.

"They got into an adventure that I wouldn't have chosen to get into, based on the level of professionalism I saw in my visits to the Georgian army," the officer said. "Who knows where this will end."

Wherever it ends, it will NOT be good for Georgia and that idiot Saakashvili, may camels urinate on his parents' graves. Perhaps now the Georgian public will finally succeed in ridding itself of this nationalistic, tyrannical, expansionist loon.

As our regular visitors and friends know, we are anti-war. However, in this world, war is the nature of the beast we call human. We also believe in calling a thug a thug. Saakashvili is a thug. This does not make Putin or Medvedev saints in comparison. Only thugs get to power because only thugs want it badly enough to engage in thuggery for it. Poets, visionaries, and humanitarians rarely hold on to power long, even when it is thrust upon them — or else they too, turn into thugs.

Ultimately, we believe in pragmatism. Tiny little countries living on the edge of big nasty countries need to be very careful not to provoke their big nasty neighbours. Because it is not the thugs who suffer. It is the poor civilians, the women, the children, the aged, infirm, and disabled. They have no way to protect themselves, much less the strength to do so. It is immoral and wrong for thugs to win power at the expense of the suffering masses. It is cruel and depraved to force these most helpless of people to bear the cost of the thugs' desire for power.

It should come as no surprise to anyone that Russia responded with force to Saakashvili's provocative acts. Georgia is a desperately poor nation, although Saakashvili is making Western investors happy by permitting a pipeline carrying oil out of BP's leased fields for European consumption, and instituting economic measures that penalize the poor and needy in favour of the rich and greedy.

The United Nations is distributing food to the victims of this engineered humanitarian crisis; Russia is setting aside funds for South Ossetia; and World Vision is working to help refugees in Tbilisi.

Part III of this lengthy post will analyze the possible reasons for this war.

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