Iraq War & Wars

Democracy in Iraq
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Iraqi War Costs
Oil, Iraq War, & Neoliberalism
Zionism: history and roots of Muslem hatred
10-Reasons to leave Iraq
DEATH COUNT 650,000--Oct 06
CIA Confirms War spawns Islamic Radical
Iraq for Sale--Edward Kennedy
Iraqi Unions fight new oil law
Iraq government death squads
Opium, Afghanistan, Bin Laden, & U.S. Policy
Democracy in Iraq
Cause of Iraq War--gen. William Clark
Marjority of the troops favor rapid exit
Milirary Base Building Reveals U.S. Plans to Stay
IRAQ WAR CAUSED BY OIL--proof, Palast
Iraq war costs $440 Billion
No Chance of Victory U.S. General Admits
U.S. DESTABILIZED REGION--Must Stay Now
Iraq war and imperialism
reconstruction? who stold the funds?
Iraq history from WWI to present
OIL-WAR PLANS BEFORE 911--document
War, Another From of Corporate Welfare
Iraq, Sunni, Shiite Struggle
General Odom on Iraq War and Isreal
Iraq War Stimulates Our Economy
U.S. Policy of Delay brought on the insurgency--Palast
Military Budget should be cut

Parliament is a public dressing for the U.S., a public face on the dressing that we have occupied another country and are taking their oil, overturning social legislation, and opening their financial and business structure to foreign domination.  We are attempting for force their parliament to sell off their oil rights, like they have already done in the business markets.  However, the Shiite, Sunni, and Kurd factions want to keep control of the oil, and thus far have resisted U.S. pressures.  It is more than oil; we are opening up the Middle East to globalization--jk. 

 

 

Views > June 1, 2007   www.inthesetimes.com

With an Empire to Build, Who Needs an Iraqi Parliament?

The Bush administration has brought democracy to Iraq, only to ignore it

By Allen McDuffee

Over the last few weeks, Iraq coverage in the U.S. media has focused on funding. On May 1, Bush vetoed the Iraq spending supplemental because it would necessitate an “artificial withdrawal.” Then last week, Democrats, while simultaneously declaring victory, caved in to Bush’s aggression and provided more war-funding than he requested. Congress’ lone requirement was mandating benchmarks for the Iraqi government, however, the funds will be available regardless of Iraqi governmental performance. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi continued the anti-war rhetoric, saying “I think the president’s policy is going to unravel now,” but the words seem empty.

 

Away from the media’s gaze toward partisan politics, however, a much more significant story was developing in Baghdad that essentially went unreported. On May 8, a majority of Iraq’s parliament signed a petition demanding a timetable for the withdrawal of American troops.

 

But the United States isn’t listening to that message, much less heeding it. Press briefings at the State Department and the White House haven’t touched on the topic. In lockstep with the Bush administration, the U.S. media ignored the story until some reporting in the alternative media such as AlterNet and criticism on blogs finally compelled them to report it. Five days after the fact, the New York Times buried the story in the middle of its front section and focused on secondary points of the petition—specifically, the readiness of Iraqi security forces—that cast the parliament more in line with the Bush administration than the Democratic Party.

 

Nearly as swiftly as the majority petition was signed, and in fear that U.S. support in Congress was waning, an opposing Iraqi delegation of U.S.-friendly senior officials and ministers was dispatched to lobby some of the most influential foreign policy members of Congress for continued military presence. Not surprisingly, the U.S. media reported this immediately.

 

The parliamentary petition is the first step in making the initiative binding. Under Iraqi law, the speaker of the parliament must present a binding resolution for a parliamentary vote when a majority of lawmakers pass a petition. Up to this point, petitions on withdrawal have fallen just short of the 138 votes required to pass. The most recent attempt occurred last fall when the parliament was able to capture only 131 signatures. (The U.S. media was quick to report that failure.) The push over the threshold this time indicates that the parliament is catching up with Iraqi citizens who, according to multiple public opinion polls, overwhelmingly want the United States out of Iraq. A poll from the University of Maryland’s Program on International Policy Attitudes found 71 percent of Iraqis want the withdrawal of U.S. troops.

 

The Bush administration ignoring the petition calls attention yet again to that it is arrogant enough to leave Iraqis out of the decision-making of their own country. And by deeming irrelevant the elected officials who put the petition in motion, the administration contradicts its only remaining argument for invading Iraq in the first place—to bring democracy to the Middle East, starting with Iraq.

 

More tellingly, disregarding the petition—and constantly threatening to veto any legislation that mandates withdrawal—highlights the Bush administration’s intent to stay. Withdrawal is a question not worth contemplating as far as the administration is concerned and isn’t on the table for earnest discussion. This explains why the administration sidestepped the Iraqi parliament’s petition and why Bush absolutely refused to accept any legislative oversight of the occupation’s progress.

 

Consider the evidence. More than a dozen extensive military bases are being built. Meanwhile, the soon-to-be-completed U.S. embassy in Baghdad, consisting of 27 buildings on more than 100 acres, has more employees than all of the other U.S. embassies around the world combined. Up to this point, according to the Government Accountability Office, the U.S. has spent more than $300 billion in military operations in Iraq. This year alone, the United States is spending $10 billion each month and conservative estimates indicate that over the next 10 years more than an additional $500 billion will be spent.

 

These are not the costs and plans for an overnight stay. Or even a five-year program abroad. These are the price tags of empire building.

 

Allen McDuffee is a Chicago-based researcher and writer focusing primarily on Middle East politics and American foreign policy.

 

As McDuffee points out things go barely mentioned in the press that speak of the U.S. future, it concerns hegemony—marginalized to dissident press.  In particular is the construction that indicates the U.S. is there to stay, the MEFTA agreements supporting our continued presences, and the silence of the Democratic party on these substantive points.  From the behavior of the Democrats, the reasonable conclusion is that they are making political points, but if in power they will too will “stay the course.”   Money talks and our government has aligned with the flat world movement. 

          History repeats itself.  We had similar designs on the Far East, and planned to stay the course in Vietnam.  The combination of the low soldier morale and popular sentiment forced us out.  And only that combination concerning Iraq will get us out.  

The actions in Congress thunders so loud I cannot hear a word that they say.  Look to the pattern, not to their words.  The pattern is bipartisan support.  Remember that The one thing you can be sure that politicians stand for is getting elected—and that takes lots of money for deep pockets.  Deep pockets want the Middle East opened up to their economic dominance.  Look to MEFTA for the future there. 

Links http://www.inthesetimes.com/links/ A large collection of the most popular left-liberal sites on the net divided into 15 categories of about 10 each. 

 

 

History repeats itself--jk

From wikipedia.org there WWII article. 

Japanese forces invaded French Indochina on September 22, 1940. The United States (after having renounced the U.S.-Japanese trade treaty of 1911), United Kingdom, Australia and the Netherlands (which controlled the oil of the Dutch East Indies), reacted in 1941 by instituting embargoes on exports of natural resources to Japan. The western powers also began making loans to China and providing covert military assistance.

Japan was faced with the choice of withdrawing from China and Indochina, negotiating some compromise, buying what they needed somewhere else, or going to war to conquer territories that contained oil, iron ore, bauxite and other resources. Japan's leaders believed that the existing Allies were preoccupied with the war against Germany, and that the United States would not be war-ready for years and would compromise before waging full-scale war. Japan thus proceeded with its plans for the war in the Pacific by launching nearly simultaneous attacks on Malaya, Thailand, Hong Kong, Hawaii, the Philippines, and Wake Island.

For propaganda purposes, Japan's leaders stated that the goal of its military campaigns was to create the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. This, they claimed, would be a co-operative league of Asian nations, freed by Japan from European imperialist domination, and liberated to achieve autonomy and self-determination. In practice, occupied countries and peoples were completely subordinate to Japanese authority.

 

The U.S. and its European allies provoked the attack by Japan by cutting off shipping of essential resources.  Egypt provoked in 1967 the war with Isreal by cutting of shipping—including oil.  And just like Egypt, even though we knew war was coming, we were asleep at the wheel. In the first couple of hours Isreali airforce destroyed the Egyptian and Jordanian air forces—which led to the rout that followed; and Japan likewise destroyed our navy.  However, Japan was not prepared to wage a ground war on our soil, as Isreal did with Egypt and Jordan. 

 

Now the U.S. had invaded the Middle East for to set up a sphere of greater prosperity—like the propaganda Japan used for its expansion, see above.  And like Japan the U.S. has occupied another nation and established our hegemony over their neighbors through the MEFTA trade agreements.    

  1. WAR MAKES MORE EVIL PEOPLE THAN IT KILLS—Immanuel Kant
 
 

The single greatest waste of human resources is war related activities.  In the period from 1945 until 1985 the United states had consumed through its military expenditures enough to build a second United States—from factories, roads to homes and consumer items.    

 

Skeptically cartoon directory

 

CARTOONS

Over 30 assorted cartoons

6 Bush cartoons

Links to best on web of bush cartoons, jokes and animation

Danish cartoons that offend Moslems

More Danish Moslems

Moslems cartoons on Jews

More Moslems cartoons plus photos

Page of links including political cartoons

Cartoon gallery, latest ones

Another California Skeptic’s collection—huge, biting, for adults

Her collection of Bush Cartoons

 

SATIRE HUMOR

One act play on Bush’s tax cut—Al Franken

Brotherhood of religions—the Nation

Letters from Earth, Mark Twain at his best

5 humorous blasts at religion—Mark Twain

Eros & Zeus—Lucian

Zeus & the modern thinking Greeks—Lucian

The damned human race—Mark Twain

Zeus the pedophile—Lucian

Doc Laura, Old Testament morality

 

 

OFF SITE CARTOONS

PILLSBURY DOUGH BOY

A FUN COLLECTION

DAN COLLINS OF HUSTLER MAGAZINE

EXCELLENT COLLECTION OF UNDERGROUND COMICS

A FUN COLLECTION

POLITICAL & SOCIAL GEMS—Mark Froce

SEXUALLY ORIENTED COLLECTION

A FUN COLLECTION

EXCELLENT MUSICAL CARTOONS—JibJab

A FUN COLLECTION

LUNACY TOONS—outrageous, quality sounds