The Rag Blog

Isn’t there a category of Darwin Award for this? Our thanks to Charlie Loving for the illustration.

Lawmaker Wounded in Iraq Wants to Go Back
AP

“I want to go back. I want to be with my team again. I want to complete the tour of duty and then I want to come home.”

Read it here, if ya wanna bother.

We are in the midst of the second Iranian hostage crisis. This time the Iranians hold 150,000 or so US and UK troops and assorted cohorts hostage in Iraq. They are abetted in this enterprise by the non-reality based US government policy of “stay the course,” which guarantees that the Bush regime won’t even consider their only possible way to avoid a humiliating defeat — “redeployment” to Kurdistan and Kuwait. It calls forth the image of General Pickett urging his men to “stay the course” as they began their assault on Cemetery Ridge at Gettysburg.

The current situation in Iraq is a ballooning disaster for the US military and it’s going to continue to go downhill. They have a matrix-like, self-regenerating dragon by the tail and a delusional commander-in-chief who thinks he’s St. George.

It is likely that the US/UK coalition is no longer the largest military force in Iraq. That honor now probably resides with the al-Sadr’s Shiite militia. So far, the US is just fighting a Sunni minority-based insurgency while exacerbating a three-cornered civil war raging around it, with a few foreign terrorists in training thrown in. Even with that limited agenda, this month is on track to be the bloodiest month since the invasion for both Iraqis and US forces. Attacks on US forces are rising to several hundred a day. Ten US soldiers were killed in five separate incidents yesterday (Tuesday).

When al-Sadr fought the US in Najaf in 2004, he had tens of thousands of followers. Now he has hundreds of thousands. It would be silly not to assume they are increasingly well-armed by the Iranians and, given the overlap between the Iraqi auxiliary to the US army and the Shiite militias, far better trained by the Americans. al-Sadr’s is only the largest of several Shiite militias. So far, except in isolated incidents, the US has not had to fight these increasingly powerful Shiite militias. As a sign of that power, yesterday, the US military was forced to cough up a senior aide to al-Sadr who they had been holding. The recent raids into Baghdad neighborhoods have left Sadr City alone. al-Sadr’s boy is the prime minister of the Green Zone “government”. al-Sadr is on record as saying that were Iran attacked, his forces would unite in common cause with Iran.

If the Shiite militias ever attacked the US forces, the position of those forces in Iraq would become instantly untenable outside heavily fortified bases supplied by air. How do they say Dien Bien Phu in Arabic? They don’t attack now largely because the US remains locked in combat with their traditional enemies, the Sunnis. But that can change.

The most likely potential cause for this de facto non-aggression pact to be broken would be a US or Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities. There have been reports of the US moving additional naval battle groups into the area of the Persian Gulf. There have been reports of Israeli politicians exclaiming that Iran poses an “existential threat” to Israel that must be eradicated soon. Add to the intensity of the moment the impending GOP electoral debacle.

Attacking Iran with no cover from the UN seems so insane as to be improbable. No one outside Israel and the Saudi ruling family really likes the idea. The Bush regime knows UN approval is unlikely at any time and they are composed of desperate ideologues whose time is running out, whose version of history isn’t playing out as they planned and who are committed to a policy of military preemption based on already existing Congressional approval of the “war on terror.” With the Democrats in control of at least one house of Congress and armed with subpeona power, presidential approval ratings stagnant in the 30’s and Iraq collapsing on Bush’s head, the Bush regime’s level of desperation will become unsustainable over the next two years. Their dreams of a new Middle East made over in their image became their worst nightmare where their only real choice is whether to leave before they’re forced to do so. Their ideology has trapped them in the embrace of an unwinable cause. We’re entering the golden age of Bush bashing, but wounded animals can be the most dangerous and this beast has nuclear weapons galore at the tip of its claw.

The most crucial goal for humanity at this moment in history is to constrain the Bush regime and its Israeli quislings from the desperate act of attacking Iran. That act would insure war in multiple manifestations, some possibly nuclear, from Afghanistan to the Mediterranean and beyond, with domestic repercussions including terrorist attacks to match. While one might wish for the opportunity to watch the empire in its death throes, the potential for collateral damage is without limit.

David Hamilton

‘Beginning of the end of America’
Olbermann addresses the Military Commissions Act in a special comment
SPECIAL COMMENT
By Keith Olbermann, Anchor, ‘Countdown’ MSNBC

[snip]

We have handed a blank check drawn against our freedom to a man who may now, if he so decides, declare not merely any non-American citizens “unlawful enemy combatants” and ship them somewhere — anywhere — but may now, if he so decides, declare you an “unlawful enemy combatant” and ship you somewhere – anywhere.

Read the rest here.

… compared to this. I didn’t know they made any drug this strong.

Rep. Peter King (R-NY) Says That Being In Baghdad Is ‘Like Being In Manhattan’

When they think the media aren’t watching, politicians like King are willing to grossly distort the facts on Iraq to their constituents for political purposes.

To read all of it and to see a video of it, click here.

What planet does this dumb rat bastard live on?

“It is difficult, no question about it, but we’ve now got over 300,000 Iraqis trained and equipped as part of their security forces. They’ve had three national elections with higher turnout than we have here in the United States. If you look at the general overall situation, they’re doing remarkably well.” – Richard B. ‘Dick’ Cheney, interview by Rush Limbaugh, October 18, 2006

Thanks to Matt at Today in Iraq for the quote.

It was so long that Riverbend was offline that I was truly apprehensive that she’d been killed, arrested, imprisoned, kidnapped … I am grateful, after reading this young Iraqi woman for over three years, that she is alive. Now we just need to give her her life back.

The Lancet Study…

[snip]

For American politicians and military personnel, playing dumb and talking about numbers of bodies in morgues and official statistics, etc, seems to be the latest tactic. But as any Iraqi knows, not every death is being reported. As for getting reliable numbers from the Ministry of Health or any other official Iraqi institution, that’s about as probable as getting a coherent, grammatically correct sentence from George Bush – especially after the ministry was banned from giving out correct mortality numbers. So far, the only Iraqis I know pretending this number is outrageous are either out-of-touch Iraqis abroad who supported the war, or Iraqis inside of the country who are directly benefiting from the occupation ($) and likely living in the Green Zone.

Read her full post here.

This is a beautiful tune from Robert Cray, one of our all-time great blues musicians. The video is on a theme we can relate to — please go listen to it here. Here’s a snip from the American Friends Service Committee Web site where you can find the Cray video.

New Music Video Features “Eyes Wide Open” Boots

The video, directed by Robert Cray’s wife, Susan Turner-Cray stars Aidan Delgado, a 23-year-old Iraq-war veteran who served in Nasiriyah and at Abu Ghraib prison, before securing conscientious objector status and returning to the U.S. David Goodman, one of the Eyes Wide Open tour managers, has a cameo role in the video as a Vietnam Veteran.

Four U.S. soldiers accused of raping and killing a 14-year-old girl and slaying her sister and their parents will face courts-martial on murder charges, military officials say.

Based on previous results in similar cases, they will probably be acquitted or face only light sentences.

Mariann told me there is poetry that goes with the photo, namely “this quote from Don Henley”:

“Nobody on the road,
nobody on the beach –
You can feel it in the air –
the summer’s out of reach…”

Judge Vacates Conviction of Ken Lay

Tuesday’s ruling thwarts the government’s bid to seek $43.5 million in ill-gotten gains prosecutors allege he pocketed by participating in Enron’s fraud. The government could still pursue those gains in civil court, but they would have to compete with other litigants, if any, also pursuing Lay’s estate. (emphasis added)

Read it here.

Again, from Juan Cole, with our thanks.

The End of Press Freedom in Iraq?

Al-Zaman, the Times of Baghdad, reports [Ar.] that press freedom may soon be a thing of the past in Iraq. The Iraqi parliament on Monday passed a resolution calling on the president of Iraq, Jalal Talabani, to intervene to close down the offices of the al-Sharqiyah television channel in Iraq, and to close down a newspaper, al-Zaman itself! Both are owned by a media group headed by Saad al-Bazzaz, and they have a mild secular, Arab nationalist tone. It is not a point of view welcome to the Shiite fundamentalists who dominate the Iraqi parliament.

Read the rest here.