Bush Setting America Up for War on Iran
Senior American intelligence and defense officials believe that President George W Bush and his inner circle are taking steps to place America on the path to war with Iran, The Sunday Telegraph has learnt.
Pentagon planners have developed a list of up to 2,000 bombing targets in Iran, amid growing fears among serving officers that diplomatic efforts to slow Iran’s nuclear weapons program are doomed to fail.
Pentagon and CIA officers say they believe that the White House has begun a carefully calibrated program of escalation that could lead to a military showdown with Iran.
Now it has emerged that Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, who has been pushing for a diplomatic solution, is prepared to settle her differences with Vice-President Dick Cheney and sanction military action.
In a chilling scenario of how war might come, a senior intelligence officer warned that public denunciation of Iranian meddling in Iraq - arming and training militants - would lead to cross border raids on Iranian training camps and bomb factories.
A prime target would be the Fajr base run by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Quds Force in southern Iran, where Western intelligence agencies say armor-piercing projectiles used against British and US troops are manufactured.
Under the theory - which is gaining credence in Washington security circles - US action would provoke a major Iranian response, perhaps in the form of moves to cut off Gulf oil supplies, providing a trigger for air strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities and even its armed forces.
Senior officials believe Mr Bush’s inner circle has decided he does not want to leave office without first ensuring that Iran is not capable of developing a nuclear weapon.
The intelligence source said: “No one outside that tight circle knows what is going to happen.” But he said that within the CIA “many if not most officials believe that diplomacy is failing” and that “top Pentagon brass believes the same”.
He said: “A strike will probably follow a gradual escalation. Over the next few weeks and months the US will build tensions and evidence around Iranian activities in Iraq.”
Previously, accusations that Mr Bush was set on war with Iran have come almost entirely from his critics.
Many senior operatives within the CIA are highly critical of Mr Bush’s handling of the Iraq war, though they themselves are considered ineffective and unreliable by hardliners close to Mr Cheney.
The vice president is said to advocate the use of bunker-busting tactical nuclear weapons against Iran’s nuclear sites. His allies dispute this, but Mr Cheney is understood to be lobbying for air strikes if sites can be identified where Revolutionary Guard units are training Shia militias.
Recent developments over Iraq appear to fit with the pattern of escalation predicted by Pentagon officials.
Gen David Petraeus, Mr Bush’s senior Iraq commander, denounced the Iranian “proxy war” in Iraq last week as he built support in Washington for the US military surge in Baghdad.
The US also announced the creation of a new base near the Iraqi border town of Badra, the first of what could be several locations to tackle the smuggling of weapons from Iran.
A State Department source familiar with White House discussions said that Miss Rice, under pressure from senior counter-proliferation officials to acknowledge that military action may be necessary, is now working with Mr Cheney to find a way to reconcile their positions and present a united front to the President.
The source said: “When you go down there and see the body language, you can see that Cheney is still The Man. Condi pushed for diplomacy but she is no dove. If it becomes necessary she will be on board.
“Both of them are very close to the president, and where they differ they are working together to find a way to present a position they can both live with.”
The official contrasted the efforts of the secretary of state to work with the vice-president with the “open warfare between Colin Powell and Donald Rumsfeld before the Iraq war”.
Miss Rice’s bottom line is that if the administration is to go to war again it must build the case over a period of months and win sufficient support on Capitol Hill.
The Sunday Telegraph has been told that Mr Bush has privately promised her that he would consult “meaningfully” with Congressional leaders of both parties before any military action against Iran on the understanding that Miss Rice would resign if this did not happen.
The intelligence officer said that the US military has “two major contingency plans” for air strikes on Iran.
“One is to bomb only the nuclear facilities. The second option is for a much bigger strike that would - over two or three days - hit all of the significant military sites as well. This plan involves more than 2,000 targets.”
Copyright 2007 Telegraph Media Group Limited
Warmonging assholes. Tony
And here’s all the Bring Iran On confirmation we need:
DefSec Gates, today:
“I think that the administration believes at this point that continuing to try and deal with the Iranian threat, the Iranian challenge, through diplomatic and economic means is by far the preferable approach. That’s the one we are using.”
The fact that they suck at diplomacy and have destroyed our economy is not relevant.
The only parallel to this madness is Germany and the Nazi war machine in World War 2. It will be a test of the American people to see how we manage to stop these crazed lunatics.
I am ASHAMED to be called American. After THIS invasion and mass murdering, there will be PLENTY to fear in this country–bet on it!!!
These crazed men want war because they know they won’t get it under a different regime.
War is money. War is profit. War is going to buy them time to keep the economy falsely rosy. War will make their family profits and investments soar. War will turn oil into gold.
The rest of the world, if it had a mind, could go after the US regime if it wanted to. It, like the American people, have chosen to not do a thing to stop these men.
Historical lessons, current events, and rational interpretation of intellegence have normally precluded egotism & theocracy for major decisions in our republic. Unfortunately, this is not the case now.
The current administration is manipulated by ego, the energy cartel,& the radical religious right wing to extents never before experienced in our history. The ill conceived invasion of Iraq, the plans to provide arms to some Middle East Countries, current suggestion to invade Iran, & the dreadful war on our environment are only some examples.
Unless Americans begin reacting to logic rather than rhetoric, and take back our country from this illegally placed administration now, the rights that we have enjoyed for two centuries may evaporate–and Americans we can blame themselves for this
Two words: election year.
Just cross your fingers and duck.
Given the level of angry resistance already, you can rest assured that any attack on Iran will include a crackdown and roundup of dissidents (you and I) as a “Homeland Security precaution.”
War is just so Christian, George. Sooo sooo Christian.
I wish you couldn’t live with yourself. It would be a good sign.
U.S. develops 14-ton super bomb, bigger than Russian vacuum bomb
13/ 09/ 2007
WASHINGTON, September 13 (RIA Novosti) - The U.S. has a 14-ton super bomb more destructive than the vacuum bomb just tested by Russia, a U.S. general said Wednesday.
The statement was made by retired Lt. General McInerney, chairman of the Iran Policy Committee, and former Assistant Vice Chief of Staff of the Air Force.
McInerney said the U.S. has “a new massive ordnance penetrator that’s 30,000 pounds, that really penetrates … Ahmadinejad has nothing in Iran that we can’t penetrate.”
McInerney described some possible military campaign scenarios and said: “The one I favor the most, of course, is an air campaign,” he continued.
He said that bombing would be launched by 65-70 stealth bombers and 400 bombers of other types…
http://en.rian.ru/world/20070913/78518873.html
Military action is always a last option and democratic countries are by definition peaceful, no really.
If the USA bombs Iran, I hope that the Americans who are most responsible will have fatal heart attacks on the same day. Thanks to them, the USA is the world headquarters for extreme horror in the world.
The prosecution of prominent members of the political, military and economic leadership of the post 9-11 USA is essentional. It might take a few years, but it must happen. Their freedom and prestige in our society is a mockery of justice.
http://www.dennis4president.com/home/
————–
CIO:
http://www.freehugscampaign.org/
Here’s an interesting quote on the current war promotion strategy:
“During a panel discussion on Monday aimed at promoting his new book The Iranian Time Bomb, Michael Ledeen, a resident scholar at AEI, criticized the “evil” nature of Iran’s clerical regime, its support for international terrorism, and the need to back Iranian dissidents and activists in a soft revolution to dislodge the mullahs from power. Along with the broad - and at times mocking - generalizations about Iran’s attempts to foment “Islamic totalitarianism” throughout the world, Ledeen, accompanied by former Central Intelligence Agency director James Woolsey and Clifford D May, president of the hawkish Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, appeared dead set against any diplomatic engagement with Iran.”
This is an exact replay of how the war with Iraq was promoted, although in that case the book was Brookings Institute ’scholar’ (ex-CIA, ex-NSA) Kenneth Pollack’s “Threatening Storm: The Case for Invading Iraq”. That book is filled with claims about Iraq’s nuclear weapons, bioweapons, ballisitic missiles, and so on - and served the exact same role that Ledeen’s “Iranian Time Bomb” is playing today. (Oddly enough, the media (NYT) has tried to respin Pollack into a ‘war critic’ - huh?)
See “Anti-Iran Hype Reaches Fever Pitch”:
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/II12Ak01.html
All the more reason for an international divestment campaign and embargo of the US. The world can stop us by crashing our economy. The threat alone would stop our ruling class in its tracks and we’d see resignations and regime change pronto.
Lebensraum all over again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This would be one big mistake.
Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq and then Iran? I reckon there is a limit to what the huge, decent majority of the world’s Muslims will take. A strike like this wouldn’t guarantee oil supplies, but it would assure eternel Muslim hatred of the west.
Cruel, unnecessary and a damned stupid idea.
Israelis should learn to get along with their neighbors or move back to eastern Europe, Russia or the U.S. where they came from. The “Christian” leaders of the U.S. should stop coveting middle-east oil. After all, it says in the Bible “Thou shalt not covet,” doesn’t it?
AUTUMN IS ON FIRE.
Did you feel the white hot flash as it lit up the sky
Do you think its an attack, do you think we will die
Is there anywhere to run
Is it worth a final try
Did you feel the searing pain as the heat burned your brain
Is it just another warning or the Americans again
Have they launched a nuclear strike
Would they be that insane
Autumn skies are crimson
The code word is Expire
And the ground is molten hot
Cos Autumn
is on fire
Did you bounce around like a stone crashin on the shore
Were you taken by surprise, no declaration of this war
They came out of the darkness
Babylon’s unleashed the whore
Autumn skies are crimson
The stakes have risen higher
Smell of burning everywhere
Cos autumn
is on fire
© roger antony carter 2007
WELCOME TO ARMAGEDDON
Black, cold tears fall from my burning eyes
Sad and screaming as the dust falls and flies like hot ashes in rain
A pulse, screaming loud in my head
Tearing me apart, ripping my heart, rupturing my brain
Terror walks free again
Cold calculation miscued and mistimed
Chances of peace disdained and refused, while double bluffs were used
Threats and bellicose shouts filled the air
The angels of death smiled and prepared, the people still amused
Horror on our screens, my friend
the stench of death offends
Welcome to Armageddon
Here gallops the fourth horse
The black cape of the Reaper
Reaching out for the corpse
(c) roger antony carter 2007
are we ever going to stop the current administration? Why don’t the Democrats start the impeachment process? Don’t use that old excuse of not having the votes to make it stick. That’s what they said during the Nixon mess. If we don’t do this, or try to do it, we deserve what we get.
When are we going to say ‘enough’ to all this hypocrisy? How about the world taking on the US on account that it keeps producing all sorts of weapons? Are nations such wimps that not a single one has the fortitude to call the US on the carpet? The US stocks enough weaponry to destroy our World over and over, and yet…oh yes, Iran must be stopped. Who the hell sold Iran all the material in the first place? The USA!!! The entire world will go up in flames on account of this destructive nation. Small consolation: in the end, the US will go under too. Hurray!
Maybe there will be an outside chance that when an order to war is issued it will be ignored. On the other hand maybe we need to get the war started so that the next civilization can start over. It would seem that we are a failed species and are incapable of making the proper connections to live within our environmental limits.
Of course they will attack Iran. They will also ignore Museums and head right to the oil fields to protect goo as they did in Iraq.
Incidents such as the flying of LIVE nuclear weapons over the US are staged to get us used to the idea that these weapons may be used. Can’t wait for the fallout.
Its obvious that the end of easily obtained Oil is coming.
Bush will have to move to an island to be safe after his pres-dent-cy is over, if ever.
He and the heartless one truly are Devils.
Well we know that! Where the hell is he going to get the troops? And I think Iran would blow him out of the water. What other country would be stupid enough to ally with him. England certainly wouldn’t especially with Tony now out of there. Uh, who?
Of course there’s the small matter of constitutional limits on the executive to make war- that this power belongs only to the people through it’s constitutionaly elected representatives congress.A minor matter of international law that no country can make premptive strikes and only use deadly force as a means of self defense if attacked. If Bush/Cheney inc. defie the American people and the constitution as well as our international treaties- sworn obligations to other countries- we the people must exercise our constitutional duties and remove both of them from office and bring criminal charges for the murder of perhaps 1.2 million human beings and the orgy of theft greed -let’s call some hearings on the policy of lockstep subservience to orders from this group of idiots whose principle premise for the invasion of Iraq was nothing but a demonstratable pack of lies and deception-Enough of this insanity .
I am nearly overwhelmed by feelings of hopelessness and helplessness. No one outside of the neocons and Christian millenialists want a war with Iran, yet no one with any power seems capable or even interested in preventing it. I have yet to hear a Democrat stand up in Congress to demand that the President obtain Congressional approval before starting such a war, nor have I heard any threats of impeachment if he proceeds without it.
Anyone who thinks that the United States is still a democracy needs to be shaken vigorously until he comes to his senses.
Hey, here is a chilling thought: what if Bush declares martial law in the middle of his next jimmied crisis and suspends the constitution? Voila, it’s not longer an election year and he can have all the power he wants. Can’t happen here you say … that is exactly why it CAN happen here; too many people are complacent with this power grabbing, lying, duplicious administation. We get the government we deserve if we are not willing to stand up and do something before it’s too late. Don’t count on hose spineless democrats. The window for political solutions in this nation is rapidly closing, leave us with only a revolutionary one. God help us all.
It appears to me that the elite of both parties running the US Government apparently have decided that the American people will refuse to tolerate the inevitable decline in our quality of life and national power as the oil starts to run out. They are certain that it will cost them their power and wealth, so they want to defend that with all of their power.
Of course, many of us already understand the implications of Peak Oil and want to start working on preparing for the post-petroleum world now. That is not in the elite’s interest, so they will fight it tooth and nail.
Therefore, they will continue to invade until the entire Middle East is either under US control or the whole thing blows up in their faces and into a shooting war: World War III. This, of course plays into the hands of the military-industrial complex, as well as the easily manipulated far Right Fundamentalists with their fears/hopes of Armageddon. Remember, their sick theology “predicts” this, so they will be cheering loudly as the blood gets deeper and deeper.
I think that this situation may already be far outside the control of the American electorate, even if they knew what all of this really means.
As far as where the US would get the troops, it is already well-established that the US has been quietly arranging for a new draft for a few years now. A long bombing campaign gives them time to hurry a bunch of cannon fodder through basic training and into place. Remember, we have about 2 years of Dubya’s administration left to go. That’s ample time to do this if they start soon. Thus, no matter who is voted in after Dubya will face a fait accompli. The US will “own” 60% of the remaining oil in the world, and the US Dollar will be secured as the only currency for petroleum, thus securing its position and stability.
The Democrats understand Peak Oil as well as the Republicans do, which is why they will make lots of noise but will be ‘unable’ to stop the current push towards war with Iran by the Republicans. They can ‘blame’ it all on the Republicans if they are elected, and if they lose there will BE no blame.
Of course, many involved are in effect neck deep in what is essentially treason, but they think that they won’t be caught or punished.
I believe Americans who oppose Bush’s illegal, immoral and unethical actions, resulting in the murder of tens of thousands of innocent people, should start bringing this government to a halt. We should 1. refuse to pay taxes, 2. take to the streets in mass protest, 3. block access to US government buildings, especially those relating to war…how long are we going to tolerate this evil? The Democrats are worthless. We elected them IN January to end the war and they are more agreeable than the Republicans in handing Bush on a silver platter anything he wants.
RE: A FEW THINGS TO THINK ABOUT RE ‘IRAN INVASION PLANS’ AND THIS ARTICLE:
a) This article is a government press release masquerading as ‘information gleaned’ - ie, it is how CheneyBushCo. choose to represent their thinking/intentions.
b) As such, it addresses both the US electorate and Iran govt: it ’softens up’ the US electorate, telling it ‘if diplomacy fails, it’s Iran’s fault; it threatens the Iran govt, telling it, ‘capitulate ‘diplomatically’ or we’ll bomb.’
c) The crap about ‘moderate’ Rice vs. the hardliners is, well, crap - good cop/bad cop theatre that declares to Iran, ‘We could still be moderate, unless you make us send in the tough guys.’
FINALLY? Don’t know - despite warships and threats, are they that crazy? I HOPE this post from another Iran war invasion thread, re interpreting apparent war preparations, is correct:
lastdregs September 12th, 2007 2:02 pm
“this piece is pretty alarmist. at this point…i don’t think military action against iran is going to happen. the tenuous hold we have in iraq would be completely undermined (meaning risking losing control of the oil fields) if we strike iran now. the tough talk creates a holding pattern for the u.s. in that region-the military gets some breathing space and the pres. gets to maintain his cowboy swagger.”
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/09/12/3803/
To which could be added, greater right wing propaganda: ‘Republicans always stood tough, just as they did on Iraq.’
on the other hand, does anyone really imagine that bush plans to just ride off into the sunset having his war been determined an absolute failure by a great deal of the (sentient) american culture? are he and cheney just going to leave it and his “legacy” like that, a big fizzle? Since they came in so semi-legitimately, to put it lightly, isn’t it somewhat likely that they’ll go out the same way?
also, I’m sure the government has inordinate info on all kinds of “what if” scenarios. Like, what if there’s any kind of large social crisis in the world right now? Highly possible if you read the news.
Perhaps for the sake of argument, fuel becomes too expensive for the masses. Now i’m not asking where anyone stands on this issue, but surely the government must think about it a little?
I’m sure bush sees that in some respects bush himself is, like israel, struggling for his for very existence. Or for the existence of those in his social class. Their backs are up against the wall or they wouldn’t be acting out this way. Because if anything goes wrong, god help them. Are there really enough police officers to keep us all at bay?
Imagine what those secret sophisticated government studies must predict about the coming years of life on earth. Surely, they too aren’t a rosy picture? I mean, just think about what the most of us are saying here on commondreams.
Does anyone know if there is any further news on the nature of the nuclear warhead transfer mistake and theories that it was actually a whistle blowing that thwarted a more insidious mission?
Please correct me if I am wrong, but Nancy Pelosi basically cleared the way for Bush to authorize bombing Iran, did she not? And the Senate voted 97-0 in favor of increased sanctions against Iran. Bush already has sent in CIA covert operations commandos, so hasn’t the war with Iran already started??
cheney is probably coming in his pants just thinking about. i’m sure bush is consulting with god to get the go ahead.
If a war takes place, and it very well may. Everybody take note, it can not be blamed on Bush and company, because the senate etc had the chance to stop all this crap with Supenoa, so when the death toll of Amarican service people rises, it is your fault, when the death toll of woman and children etc (Civilians) reaches a couple of million (it has passed 1 million already). You will be unable to blame the “BUSH Cabal” because you Mr. and Mrs. US citizen are responsible entirely. You will have created enemies that will haunt you, your children, and your descendance for the next two thousand or more years. Ultimately your nation will suffer millions of casualties with no recourse what ever. Tourists will be murdered, buseness travelers will die because you lacked the guts to stop this, impeach, imprison and execute the criminals, or die, and your country with you! Always remember Pelosi and her henchmen set it up but you let it happen!
info on why the US will be attacking Iran:
“US Attack on Iran Imminent”
http://www.chycho.com/?q=us_iran_attack
what will happen when the US attacks Iran:
“What an attack on Iran really means: Gwynne Dyer’s Secret”
http://www.chycho.com/?q=Gwynne_Dyer
and what they will be suing in the attack and how you can stop it:
“WW3 Has Already Started or: 18 Ways To Stop The Bomb”
http://www.chycho.com/?q=stopthebomb
I know this has been said many times — but my soul needs to scream as I am a father and a mate to a fellow human being. I love life. I love the world, community and cherish nature. I love the diversity which we all represent. I am a teacher — an oral historian and photo journalist who documents the life stories of all kinds of people — all of whom are entitled to dignity and respect. I have no want to fight anyone. I, my family and the vast majority of people I know seek to resolve differences in civil ways.
What my soul screams is that these individuals who have overtaken and bullied their way into and through the Executive branch of our government are monsters of hate — they hate life and people — they hate democracy — they hate nature, art and beauty — they hate civil rights and freedom. When they speak of evil — they know it all too well — because they speak of themselves. May we all be liberated from their sociopathic worship of fear, war, death and power. May we re-claim the vision of this great country and make it through the darkness that these sick, black hearts have made of our country and seek to make of the world. May we soon restore balance and sanity soon.
Isn’t this article ipso facto an example fear creating in the US of A and elsewhere?
When we see this article, do we see them as US propaganda?
Lords of the New Church
“Open Your Eyes”
(1982)
Video games train the kids for war
Army chic in high fashion stores
Law and order’s done their job
Prisons filled while the rich still rob
Assassination politics
Violence rules within our nation’s midst
Well ignorance is their power tool
You’ll only know what they want you to know
The television cannot lie
Controlling media with smokescreen eyes
Nuclear politicians picture show
The acting’s lousy but the blind don’t know
Open your eyes
See the lies right in front of you
Open your eyes
See the lies right in front of you
Open your eyes
See the lies right in front of you
Open your eyes
They scare us all with threats of war
So we forget just how bad things are
You taste the fear when you’re all alone
They’re gonna get you when you’re on your own
The silence of conspiracy
Slaughtered on the altar of apathy
You gotta wake up from your sleep
‘Cause meek inherits earth six feet deep
Open your eyes
See the lies right in front of you
Open your eyes
See the lies right in front of you
Open your eyes
See the lies right in front of you
Open your eyes
I dunno–I think they are going to need a small army of security from Blackwater when they are out of office if they strike Iran.
Dickhead will have to look over his shoulder when he is out on one of his hunting trips. Though paranoid coward that he is, he probably does so already. He just shoots unarmed wildlife so he can play soldier without the consequences.
Please look at this:
http://www.therealnews.com/web/index.php?thisdataswitch=0&thisid=424&thisview=item
It’s a ridiculous assertion that diplomacy is failing. There’s been no diplomacy, only bullying by the two punks in the White House and their neocon minions. Despicable!
It is past time for talking.
Go to Washington throw the sons of bitches out.
Only you can do it, remember the power of one, you have it, do it, now.
As of now I have made up my mind, the next USAer I find masquerading as Canadian will be outed with a thumping.
This article is a surprise? He and his cronies have been setting this up for the last year or so.
I wonder when the right will wake up and realize how far wrong they’ve gone? My best guess is, when it’s too late.
What scares me most are the consequences. Do you really think that they don’t have a few doomsday plans up their sleeves? Maybe a few missiles lobbed into downtown Tel Aviv or perhaps the destruction of half a dozen US embassies in the style of the Nairobi tragedy? We think we are so insulated in the Middle East but we’re really not, we’re merely lucky. They just haven’t been provoked quite enough yet.
And asl yourselves - where will the troops come from - and the money? These administration men are quite simply madmen.
Joe
Joe: “where will the troops come from - and the money?”
1) Blackwater 2) the money ran out long ago, but that hasn’t stoppt anything so far.
I am wondering how it is that America can assassinate people like JFK, RFK, and MLK, but can tolerate people like Bush, Cheney, and Condi.
I hate to say this, but I don’t think it matters what we do at this point. Bush and Cheney do what they want. If Congress tried to impeach them, which they won’t, they would just shut it down. They do what they want to do and let the rest of us and future generations suffer the consequences.
I regularly copy articles like this and send to my congressional representatives. However, I wonder whether any of them have the wherewithall to try to do anything about it. Your average person on the street doesn’t care as much about this as they do about what is at the movies this week. It is very disheartening.
It’s time American citizens kidnapped Bush-Cheney et al. and took them to the Hague for a war crimes trial.
Yes, there is an axis of evil. It runs from Washington through London to Tel Aviv. But with Blair out in the UK and Sarkozy looking warlike, we might have to replace London with Paris.
But who has enabled Bush to be so warlike? It all points to the Democrats and their determined inaction on the war issue. Don’t they understand that the longer they allow American troops to stay in Iraq the wider range they give the Cheney Administration to carry out its evil designs?
And we will continue to lie here taking it up the ar$$e because we like Bush so much.
Why waste the fuel anney? Millstones are fairly cheap and effective, and we only need drag them to the Potomac thereby making the operation green!! We’ll call it Operation Green Earth. Ridding the world of 2 of the most heinoius criminal minds on the planet - mass murderers. Calling these criminals anything else is complete BS.
I want to hear form the Republicans who foamed and frothed at the maw when Clinton “invaded” Serbia. Where are your mealy mouths now? Or is it Serbian lives are worth more than Iraqi lives? Oh I suppose you believe the latest Bush puppet Petraous’ BS dog and pony propaganda show. Do you see a pattern here? This is what the 5th different General to be “in charge” in Iraq now? Each one has the same F’d up plan of more and more death… then they retire after a year in hell (iraq) and then they manage to find the moral fortitude to speak up. Of course by then their pension has been secured for their acquiesence and their job already filled by the next Patrieous Maximus clown to enter the big top called the White House. I wonder how many lose sleep over the lives of young soldiers they have lost with their YES MEN-tality. I hope they all rot in hell with Bush and Cheney.
It has been quite apparent for a long time that Bush & Company are trying to draw Iran into invading Iraq. We can only hope that saner heads prevail in Iran or that our military will have the courage to arrest the war criminals leading the the instigation.
It’s a cinch that no one in Congress has the courage to call Bush & Company out and most of our so-called presidential candidates appear to be just more of the same crap that we have been tolerating for the past six years.
America appears to be doomed to wars that the sane people don’t want but the war-profiteers and religious fanatics DO want!
Israel is pushing for war with Iran. The next holocaust will be in the Middle East and the blood will be on the US and Israel’s hands, as usual.
Military supremacy, the god of forces, is the golden calf of the neocons… it is also perceived almighty by Christian Zionism and arrogantly brandished by Bush and Cheney: the eunuchs who manage the harem of an Oriental household; it is the champion of a Philistine culture which has defied the living God.
Not unlike Goliath of Gath, this champion now vaunts itself to an audience of adulating Western politicians and their governments.
This idol of Mystery Babylon has so intoxicated the Beast and its image that they are now drunken with the blood of the saints…
Goliath is manifest before a cowering American Christianity… daily murdering their co-religionists (as well as muslims) with impunity in Gaza, the West Bank, Afghanistan, Iraq… and other locations, as the Washington, D.C. Philistine spokesmen gloat of adding Iran to their ‘hit list’.
Lord Acton observed: “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely” and the United States has metamorphosed from a liberty-loving republic to a lawless world empire… in step with ‘the Virgin daughter of Zion’ (the Church) which has fornicated and adulterated itself into the role of the whorish ‘harlot of Babylon’.
Who can stand against this believed-to-be-invincible military colossus, Goliath, as aided and abetted by a legion of false prophets ?
Well… perhaps a modern-day David, motivated by a thirst for justice, weary of foreign destroyers, grieving at the senseless oppression of his people, mindful of the eternal verities, confident in the power of right… and resolute in the conviction to oppose wrong… ? Perhaps an Aryan nation, which will vindicate the cause of all Arabs and Kurds ? And precipitate the fall not only of Goliath, but of Mystery Babylon, itself ?
Scripture asserts that this has happened before… a one-sided contest which came down to a mighty-man-of-war versus a thought-to-be-harmless shepherd boy… and a fatal upset, of truly biblical proportions.
More recently, it has occurred in little Lebanon: a mighty aggression, succesfully countered by a contemporary Hebraic, imagined-helpless Hezbollah against a Philistine state’s IDF and its infrastructure-destroying WMDs. Please note in the denouement which dog’s tail was tucked between its legs.
With all of this as background, please assess the credibility of a current post on http://www.farsnews.com/English/farsnews.php
Of course, propaganda is found in every media. Is this brag ? Or could it be fact ?
TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- A Senior commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said that today Iran can hit enemy targets within a range of two thousand kilometers.
Speaking to reporters in the western city of Kermanshah on Sunday, top commander of the IRGC in western Iran General Mohammad Hassan Kousehchi said, “We are proud that today we can target enemies within a range of two thousand kilometers and that we can powerfully and courageously resist against any kind of enemy with the weapons that we have.”
He further pointed to the Iraqi imposed war on Iran in the 80s, and reminded that despite the unorganized nature of the IRGC and its affiliated Basij (volunteer) troops, it was the only war in the past three centuries during which Iran did not lose even a span of its territories.
The General noted Iran’s strategic position, and said, “While there are only 12 strategic points in the whole world, two of these points are in the Persian Gulf.”
He warned enemies that if they embark on belligerent moves against Iran, the Islamic Republic would target them with its powerful military weapons and equipment, especially its powerful Shahab 3 missile.
“Fortunately, we have such a good control over the region that no enemy can even think of invading Iran,” he said.
Meantime, the IRGC official dismissed allegations that Iran is surrounded by the US troops in the region, saying, “In fact, these are the Americans who are surrounded by us as they are now within the range of our fire. Today we can target any kind of enemy move made by the Americans even by our short range missiles.”
He also rejected the Untied States’ military superiority over Iran, and said, “It is true that we do not have an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf, but God has gifted us with several islands in the same Persian Gulf that we can use as an aircraft carrier.”
IN EITHER CASE, OUR PATRIA IS IN DIRE STRAITS !
All “Republicans,” Neocons, and everyone who approves of a war with Iran must be immediately deported, en masse, to…Iran! Cheney and Bush must be ON the first bomb they drop on any country!
They prove that “good” and “evil” exist only in the human mind. And we all know which side they are on. It ain’t the “good” side.
The axis of evil:
started in central Germany,
invaded England,
conquered Turtle Island (America)
by commiting genocide on the native peoples
and enslaving Africans;
all depends on your perspective…
“The axis of evil:
started in central Germany,
invaded England,
conquered Turtle Island (America)
by commiting genocide on the native peoples
and enslaving Africans;
all depends on your perspective…”
Turtle Island has been unable to expel immigrants for over five hundred years
In the picture you see the worst evil faces on the earth.
USA = United States of Armageddon
The “self-righteous” country led by a “self righteous” dictator will continue to spill the innocent blood in the world.
RE: INTELLIGENCE GEARS UP FOR WAR IN EXPECTATION OF ‘FAILED DIPLOMACY’? WHAT ‘DIPLOMACY’?
bobnewman September 16th, 2007 5:09 pm
“It’s a ridiculous assertion that diplomacy is failing. There’s been no diplomacy, only bullying”
Correct: The idea of “growing fears among serving officers that diplomatic efforts to slow Iran’s nuclear weapons program are doomed to fail” is advance propaganda to justify an attack: in fact, not only has there been no diplomacy - there has been no support for the idea that Iran is engaged in activities REQUIRING diplomacy.
Jeffrey Courion is right on. How did these hate-filled, shadows of true men infiltrate the executive branch? How did we as a nation let this happen? Something is deeply wrong with our democracy when a great majority of people are peace-loving caregivers and we vote in some of the most blood-thirsty tyrannts in world history..
If you want to see the people responsible for the outrages we are committing - look in a mirror.
We as a people have ignored through acquiesence all that these leaders do.
Do we have any courage? I doubt it.
Until the US populace gets the courage to take to the streets and follow the example of Gandhi’s non-violent marches and demonstrations nothing will change. The people have got to WANT the Constitution restored enough to ACT accordingly. If there is no such desire, there will will be no more US Constitution (except in name only).
Things will change only when the populace is alienated and hopeless.
Then they may :
STAND UP - for what they beleive to be right.
SIT DOWN - in the nearest street to bring transportaion, retail, everything to a standstill.
FIGHT - I hope like Gandhi’s Pathan friend Badshar Khan(Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan) (check him out)a Pashtun nonviolent Muslim
FIGHT - Even if it means sacrifice to themselves to totally repudiate the oligarchy
FIGHT - As if their lives depend on active resistance - which they do
When people realize that they cannot ignore the actions of the government and relaize they themselves are the governmet, only then is change possible.
What a shame to let cowardice bring down such a noble experiment of human governance!!
Here are some comments by a man who stood by Gandhi - Badshah Khan, who led a 100,000 person army of non-violent Pashtuns from the Khyber pass region. He was a Pashtun (Afghan) political and spiritual leader known for his non-violent opposition to British Rule during the final years of the Empire on the Indian sub-continent. He was a lifelong pacifist and a devout Muslim. He was known as Badshah Khan (sometimes written as Bacha Khan), the `King of Chiefs’, and `Frontier Gandhi’.
“To me nonviolence has come to represent a panacea for all the evils that surround my people. Therefore I am devoting all my energies toward the establishment of a society that would be based on its principles of truth and peace.” –
Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan
“Today’s world is traveling in some strange direction. You see that the world is going toward destruction and violence. And the specialty of violence is to create hatred among people and to create fear. I am a believer in nonviolence and I say that no peace or tranquility will descend upon the people of the world until nonviolence is practiced, because nonviolence is love and it stirs courage in people.” – Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan to an interviewer in 1985
His story is contained in ‘Nonviolent Soldier of Islam: Badshah Khan, A Man To Match His Mountains’, by Eknath Easwaran (Published by Nilgiri Press).
Also see NPR highlights:
http://www.npr.org/programs/musings/2003/jan/khan.html?sc=emaf
P.S.
We have spent more time mentally masturbating about our views and how nice we are and woe is me and how could this happen than taking action.
If we do not get off our collective ass`s soon, there will not be anything left of this once great nation.
Benjamin Franklin, one of our founding father`s once said and I quote “Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety” oddly enough this was said on Sept. 11 1759.
It is time to act and act now and demand impeachment!!
What diplomacy??? Every force is met with equal and opposite reaction.
All of USA must remember we the people will have carry the consequence of murder and mayhem. As burden for paying taxes into this war machinery ( on going since 1950’s). As Germans and Japan have to carry along side their self respectibility. This leadership is ready to doo their deed and leave US holding the bloody bag.
If no one can stop this war over oil ( not even almighty GOD). We have to hand over the whole industrial-military-congressional complex to war crime tribunal. As Serbia had to with their warrior leader. Hand over self defence to another country like Japan and Germany had to.
This has happened before and will happen again. Get ready. We will loose more than oil in the Middle East if they continue with their kind of diplomacy.
Is there any way to lie out of this?
DefSec Gates, today:
“I think that the administration believes at this point that continuing to try and deal with the Iranian threat, the Iranian challenge, through diplomatic and economic means is by far the preferable approach. That’s the one we are using.”
Gates is referring to the IMAGINARY Iranian threat DELIBERATELY INVENTED to justify another war for oil. Just like the dire threat to us that was posed by Saddam with those imaginary WMD.
Time and time again they dishonestly said things like “We dont want to bomb Iraq - All Saddam has to do is to destroy his WMD”. And when Saddam pointed out that these had been destroyed 12 years ago as a requirement for getting the murderous sanctions lifted, his words were denounced as “Obvious lies” - without a shred of real evidence.
I am DISGUSTED!!!
If somebody had invaded the United States and took out the sewer rats that infested our government, we might be grateful. If they then decided to stay here and “help” us until we could govern ourselves in the manner they felt was right, wouldn’t we be doing the same thing the Iraqis are doing? We would bomb, ambush, kill, destroy both the enemy and the quislings that were cooperating with them, no matter how much they tortured and killed us; destroyed our towns and cities and laid waste to our crops.
If Canadians or Mexicans were to help us, the other side would call them terrorists, too, but we would be grateful for every scrap of help we could get, and for every “freedom fighter” that would sneak across the border to help.
That is probably what is going on right now with Iran and Syria and anybody else who feels that the Iraqis are occupied for no legitimate reason except for their oil and a place to put forward strike bases for the rest of the conquest of the middle east.
Iran has no record of aggressive wars, but they do have a first class military, with up to date aircraft, air defense, missiles and a well trained army, navy and air force.
Iraq had starved for ten years, with no spare parts for their aging armor, no air force left at all, and their air defense had been destroyed by ten years of overflights and preemptive bombing. Taking Iraq was easy.
Taking Iran is going to be a nightmare, with world wide repercussions. China and Russia, plus a number of ex-Soviet states have treaties with Iran and close commercial ties. Does Cheney/Bush think they are all going to sit on their hands as we start bombing Iran, let alone unleashing nuclear weapons?
Iran may well be Bush’s Poland, where the world has had enough and decides to fight back against the butchers of civilization.
Should that happen, I think the grand experiment, begun in 1776 will come to an end; probably a bloody end.
If our alleged Democratically controlled government doesn’t step in to head off this insanity, and if there is not enough sanity and good judgment amongst the military then, sadly, we shall deserve what we shall receive.
Iran is no threat to us. We are not in imminent peril of an attack or invasion from them. This war is going to be spun as “they are endangering Mid-East stability”, but the real reason is, just the opposite. The problem is they are trying to make a friend. Iraq.
When the Iraqi government invited Iranian energy consultants to Baghdad, U.S. forces arrested, and briefly detained them. This was a not-so-subtle message. Stay away.
Benchmark #3 for Iraq is “Oil Revenue Sharing”. It has not been accomplished yet. That is when those men who Dick Cheney refused to identify, the ones who crafted our country’s energy policy, sit down with the Iraqi government and sign high profit oil contracts.
Iran’s oil contracts are with Russian and Chinese firms. It is not exactly a quantum leap to see where this is going. If Iraq cozies up to Iran, the Bush/Cheney oil buddies lose. That cannot be allowed, under any circumstances.
Anyone who messes with this administration’s friends making money must be considered a threat to us, terrorists, crazy, and suicidal.
And how can we consider another country to be a threat to Middle East stability? Ask any Middle Easterner who the threat is. Consistantly, they answer “The U.S.”
#
Jeffrey Courion writes: September 16th, 2007 4:38 pm
“I know this has been said many times — but my soul needs to scream as I am a father and a mate to a fellow human being. I love life. I love the world, community and cherish nature. I love the diversity which we all represent. I am a teacher — an oral historian and photo journalist who documents the life stories of all kinds of people — all of whom are entitled to dignity and respect. I have no want to fight anyone. I, my family and the vast majority of people I know seek to resolve differences in civil ways.”
“What my soul screams is that these individuals who have overtaken and bullied their way into and through the Executive branch of our government are monsters of hate — they hate life and people — they hate democracy — they hate nature, art and beauty — they hate civil rights and freedom. When they speak of evil — they know it all too well — because they speak of themselves. May we all be liberated from their sociopathic worship of fear, war, death and power. May we re-claim the vision of this great country and make it through the darkness that these sick, black hearts have made of our country and seek to make of the world. May we soon restore balance and sanity soon.”
JEFFREY COURION … I went to your site and saw the photograph of the baby’s hand in the adult’s hand … Gentle, sensitive soul … I echo your prayer above.
We are the Germans, the Italians, the Japanese now. Just as Hitler and his Nazi cohorts, Mussolini and his Corporate shills, Japan and its military war mongers twisted the people’s governments out of shape, and gathered their forces and then attacked … we are history’s repeat-of-story assemblage.
How many Germans sat around their kitchen tables and tried to find sense and reason and ways to stop what was underway? How many Germans lay in bed at night talking in worried tones with their spouses and lovers wondering what would happen to their lives and the lives of their children and families? How many Germans became fearful as the signs were everywhere of punishment and incarceration if one actively opposed the Fuehrer and his “government”? How many Germans began to walk with their heads down trying to be as unobtrusive as possible? How many walked on with poker faces as old Jewish men and women were assaulted by young Nazi soldiers because it was the safest thing to do?
We’re almost there now. Hitler’s plans were in the works for a decade or more. So have the plans been in the works of the Bush cartel of family, Right Wingers, NeoCons, elected ones in the hallowed halls of Congress, corporate and media whores, and all the rest of the greedy, ambitious-for-empire, psychopathic devils from this country and across the seas where the arrogant White, racist Colonialists are still firmly entrenched, and in Israel where the Zionist cabal has planned, acted and dreamed of this day and are now rubbing their collective hands together as the dream seems to be coming to fruition.
We are the Germans now, … and the Italians and the Japanese … and even many of the French, who have now voted in Sarkozy as Premier, a man cut from old, familiar cloth.
The world blamed the citizens back then for doing nothing, and now U.S. of A. Americans for allowing what is happening to happen.
It is not easy evidently for us of the U.S. of A. who understand and know what is happening to figure out what to do. The old ways of marches and protests, letter writing, appealing to elected officials … none of it is working. The media is purposefully blind and silent and distorts snippets of truth. We have been propagandized to death … to accept the deaths of others.
Iraqis, the Palestinians, the Somalians, the Darfurians, the Lebanese, and the peasants in Columbia and so many others caught in the crossfire of brutal, vicious insanities … GENOCIDE is happening and more is planned.
We are the Germans now … and all the others. The detention camps are ready. … And so are the bombs.
Reasoned, compassionate thinking is lost on those who have no conscience and are driven by their irrational, insane compulsions. Brutality is nothing to them.
Our governmental mechanisms are failing.
Who are you and who am I? We have entered the hours and days of our individual and national and spiritual testing. And the anvil is hot and the coals are glowing redder and redder.
I echo your prayer, Jeffrey.
where did the writer who wrote that the “majority of americans are peaceloving caregivers” get that idea?
i see them (us) as selfish shopaholic sportaholic ignoramuses
also easily led by the nose by aipac who is not afraid of killing the goose that lays the golden eggs for it (subsidizes israel)
The Bush gang have no options left, they have been defeated in Iraq and the only way to hide that defeat is to escalate the conflict and by the time it’s all over and the US troops repeat the retreat from Moscow the Bush gang will be long gone.
The number of Americans who bought the 9/11 nonsense and supported Bush are to blame and from what I saw that was most of the population.
Anyone who believes word 1 that comes out of the idiot president’s mouth is a fool (me twice). There is a very simple way to tell when W is lying — his lips are moving.
I agree with those who say that “we are the Germans”.
But, more importantly, WHERE IS THE WORLD???
I’ve been saying over and over and over that the only way to stop these SOB’s from doing more damage to this country and the rest of the world is impeachment. They are dangerous. These are NOT people who listen to anyone - not Congress, not the rule of law, not the courts, not the American people, not allies, not reason, not anything or anyone. When Bush stole the election again in 2004, I was sick with despair because I knew then, as did so many others, that we were totally screwed, and our national nightmare has only gotten worse. Sy Hersch has been warning about his plans for Iran for quite some time, while as usual, the MSM ignores it. If Bush wants to bomb Iran, just who do you think is going to stop him? Short of a coup, there’s no one to stop him should he decide to give the order.
Well written, Cee Miracles. Thank you.
Get ready for the administrations next joke. THeir “presentation” (performance) of “evidence” (doctored photos/cooked books) to the UN.
Most likely using more Wrong INformation, as coined by Colin Powell this past year, referring to the magnificent performance that duped so many people, mostly Americans, in 2003.
I detest our Knee walking “leaders for what htey’ve done to the world and I detest the U.S. sheeple for not only allowing it, but revelling in it.
A nation of sheep, led by a cartel of whores, controlled by Israel / big business. Welcome,… to the REAL Evil Empire.
STOP IT! WHOA!
Just who is this “WE” some of you keep talking about deserving what “WE” get. SCREW THAT! You are mostly preaching to the choir here on these pages anyway. Direct your energy where it belongs.
I’ve been fighting against this asshole Bush and his buddies since BEFORE HE WAS “ELECTED”–because I was paying attention a long time ago.
I was fighting and resisting the war machine, counseling young people to find alternatives to “joining up” since the before that day in Oakland when I refused to go to Vietnam in 1971!
Go talk to your neighbors who are ignorant or complacent and just don’t care, Go stand in front of a recruiting center in your own real town and stop uninformed desperate kids from joining, give them an alternative– but don’t keep saying “WE’ get what we deserve…My kids and grandkids certainly don’t deserve this shit and neither do yours!
Keep resisting but put the energy beyond blaming the ephemeral “WE”. Go sit in Pelosi’s office or something active.
Were all you jazzbos that are screaming “we” at the march on DC?
Get fucking real and DO something!
I take that stuff PERSONALLY! WHICH IS WHAT “WE” NEED TO DO–GET UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL.
To cheer yourselves up:
1. Print out a hard copy of the two crazed ‘bar-stewards’ pictured above, then take a red pen and draw two little red holes in each forehead.
2. Now with a black pen, draw the eyes eternally closed…
Okay, that’s only picture, but there are a *million or more* people alive on this planet right now who are aiming to achieve that for real.
Think about that.
~And it only takes *one* to succeed, (such as a sorely disaffected staffer in the Grey House or Pentagon etc?) …
____________________
Moving on, -the two much-reviled lunatics pictured above have, (actually) no REAL power in themselves, as little tiny human beings.
They are just fragile, evil little sprites who are bending *the System* so as to create their chosen mass pain and chaos in the world.
What can they ACTUALLY do, **on their own**?
They can only create havoc via the aegis of the dupes who (may or may not) fly bombing aircraft, etc.
Now just imagine… what if we could prevent those bombers from ever lifting off the ground? What if we could persuade the pilots to stay home that day?
What if we could convince the lifeline support services to sit down and not fuel / equip the pilots, and that whole war machine?
Ain’t that just a pretty picture?
And is it an achievable one?
*Love is a tonic and antidote to fear: Drink one glass a day!*
xx
If it’s true that Bush is ready to declare war on Iran, then that event presents the perfect time for the Democrats to begin impeachment procedings aginst Bush and Cheney. If the Democrats won’t do it, then the Democrats are complicit in the war atrocities done in the name of this country.
Cee:
“Who are you and who am I? We have entered the hours and days of our individual and national and spiritual testing. And the anvil is hot and the coals are glowing redder and redder.
I echo your prayer, Jeffrey.”
[et tu sis] xx
papananuck writes:
75.
“Get fucking real and DO something!
I take that stuff PERSONALLY! WHICH IS WHAT “WE” NEED TO DO–GET UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL.”
You got it, papananuck !!!
The POWER OF ONE begins with me, as does PEACE, COMPASSION, KINDNESS, COURAGE … one to one … not HIM/HER/THEM.
… and gratitude for putting yourself on the red- hot anvil all these years.
You never get used to it, but you can learn to dance well.
#
UN-common-dreams writes: September 16th, 2007 9:34 pm
What can they ACTUALLY do, **on their own**?
They can only create havoc via the aegis of the dupes who (may or may not) fly bombing aircraft, etc.
Now just imagine… what if we could prevent those bombers from ever lifting off the ground? What if we could persuade the pilots to stay home that day?
What if we could convince the lifeline support services to sit down and not fuel / equip the pilots, and that whole war machine?
Ain’t that just a pretty picture?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hope and comfort appears apropos of these thoughts
on The Patriots site … www.the patriots.us/
Read the letter or for easier reading, download for .pdf. file: Dr. Bob Bowman’s letter to the New Generation of Young Military Officers Preserving and Protecting Our Nation.
Bob Bowman was/is a Lt. Col., USAF, ret.
Startling. And if there is one such Patriot, there’s gotta’ be more.
Moving toward The Thermadorian Reaction … Hope springs eternal …
Does this mean the Bush Administration is winning the War on Terror because the world is more frightened of it now than Al Qaeda?
Or is it The Media that’s winning the War on Terror?
Or is no one winning, but everyone is beating a drum?
Is the pen mightier than the drum?
Zeese on Israeli lobby pushing for war with Iran:
http://tinyurl.com/2e436y
This OLD news!!! There have been news reports about impending strikes on Iran for 6 months. bush promised to “punish Iran” for meddling in Iran three weeks ago at at a VFW Convention.
Americans are NOT listening and not processing these news reports. Congresspeople are silent about the reports of plans for bombing Iran. Every one better be ready for S8.00 per gallon gasoline because that’s what we will be getting soon.
Keith Campbell
Denver
The question is, who’s still buying his crap? If Congress sanctions it, if the American people don’t rise up in unholy indignation, if we simply carry on going to the mall, Circuit City, Costco, BestBuy, Target, Tuesday Mornings, Bed Bath and Beyond, etc, etc. Then, I suppose, the US deserves every ounce of pay back we will be unleashing. Just exactly who is making us so vulnerable to terrorists? I’d venture to say it’s our leadership, who can’t seem to comprehend that victims of bullying often strike back in unexpected, irrational, and out-of-proportion ways.
By the way, isn’t it our Secretary of State’s job to try to de-fuse these sorts of situations. I thought diplomacy would be our first course of action. Oh, I forgot, Bush/Cheney/Condi don’t know the meaning of the word.
I don’t think I want to do this anymore. I feel like we are writing on a bathroom wall. Isn’t this just a way to vent that keeps us sitting at a computer terminal instead of doing something more productive? I wonder.
one more thing, if i may:
noam chomsky:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noam_Chomsky
here’s his web site:
http://www.chomsky.info/
is the person to whom i hold all other people. he is a wise and beautiful human being and he has written extensively on the republic and other power structures. he has provided us, with his writings and speeches, an insight into power and history and we should try to learn from him.
he has written about the nuclear disaster of cold war 11 here:
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=11&ItemID=13629&
chomsky has been sharply criticized by the 9/11 counter theorists who are bitter because chomsky doesn’t see the government behind those attacks.
i disagree with this great man over this as well but let’s not further vilify chomsky or doubt his courage. he has stood up to tyrants and he will stand up to us as well.
maybe, we the counter theorists, should get off our high horses and reconsider our facts. that is never a bad thing.
all we could do is reconfirm ourselves.
noam chomsky, live long and prosper.
The Likud government of France joins their branch in Washington:
The world must “must prepare for the worst” - including the possibility of war - in light of the Iranian nuclear crisis, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said Sunday.
“We have to prepare for the worst, and the worst, sir, is war,” Kouchner said in an interview on LCI television and RTL radio.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/904014.html
UN COMMON DREAMS
why do they have to put their bloody picture there anyway? we know what they look like and it puts me off my breakfast. i swear i cannot eat it now…………i feel sick…………
MADLIB
yes is the answer!!!! but i feel you americans may have finally had enough and someone will do something. like the scenario Un common dreams pointed out. i f;;;;;;;;;ing hope so……………..
WISHFULLTHINKER
good idea. can you give websites to visit and i’ll do the same as i am not in a position to go to washington either………and what about the million iraqis too??
“Michael Ledeen, a resident scholar at AEI,”
This is how the punk hustlers at the “American Enterprise Institute” — doesn’t that sound respectable? — function, by constantly referring to their admen as “scholars”. This is the same wheezy little bastard who boasted that the US needs to take some “shitty little country & throw it up against the wall just to show the world that we mean business”. All these sleazy cheap typists talk tough but would faint if their own tactics were for a moment applied to them.
Long ago, Bush stated his desire to trigger the Christian Rapture by bringing about Armageddon. His presidency is slipping away. This may be his last chance. Not that Iran can retaliate, but the Islamic State of Pakistan HAS nuclear weapons with Cruise missiles to deliver them. Since they are already home of Al Qaeda and the Taliban, it shouldn’t take much to stir them to take umbrage against having yet another Islamic nation attacked by America.
Why don’t Americans rise up against the maniac in the Oval Office? He who speaks to God one to one?
I take small solace from the fact that he is your problem and not Canada’s, but in many respects Bush IS Canada’s problem because he is affecting the entire world at this point.
He says History will judge him. I say the American people better hold the trial NOW if they want the world to be here for a future.
Dear Coco,
May your appetite for a (well-deserved), more wholesome *life* return soon, - as soon as you recover from seeing those awful plastic ghouls slip out of your packet of *cornfakes*
-be well sis.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I tried CeeMiracle’s link above. by way of assistance, the following one may work a little better?
http://www.oregontruthalliance.org/?q=node/178
~ it’s headed: “An Open Letter to the New Generation of Military Officers Serving and Protecting Our Nation.”
It’s powerful, and very moving stuff, and begins with the following inspiring text:
““The Nuremberg Principles says that we in the military have not only the right, but also the DUTY to refuse an illegal order. It was on this basis that we executed Nazi officers who were ‘only carrying out their orders’…
The Constitution which we are sworn to uphold says that treaties entered into by the United States are the ‘highest law of the land,’ equivalent to the Constitution itself.
“Accordingly, we in the military are sworn to uphold treaty law, including the United Nations charter and the Geneva Convention… Based on the above, I contend that should some civilian order you to initiate a nuclear attack on Iran (for example), you are duty-bound to refuse that order.
“I might also suggest that you should consider whether the circumstances demand that you arrest whoever gave the order as a war criminal.””
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-enjoy. weep. - then act!
And be sure to send a copy of this letter to all you think ought read it, -such as the right/wrong-winged people! Hand a copy to the squawking-canary ‘Eagles’ on your next demo?
Ask your politicians to read it, and then comment on it?
How about printing off loads of copies and leaving them in bus stations, -on trains, in shopping malls, glued to lampposts, distributed near military bases… (you’ll get the picture here I’m sure)…
And ensure there is some sort of *address*, or phone number or contact details, ‘coz when folks are waking up from their *sleep of ages*, they’ll need to talk and ‘debrief’ with others of a like mind. Encourage all you meet, to act, and act soon.
**You are not without SPIRIT!** (-hear that anyway you will!)
In this way, we help change the consciousnesses of people… from vile warfare, towards a properly peaceful world.
And in this manner we alter the course of history…
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If we EACH do as we can, right across America, and the wider world, we’ll not be submerged in the gunk ‘the fools on the hill’ are dishing out.
Like many other sisters + brothers here, I’ve been at this ‘changing thang’ for many a long day, - a meddlesome, completely medal-free ‘vet’ of alternative stuff!
I may well be ‘a silly eegit’, -but at least I’m a very committed one!
And we HAVE had our successes along the way! And yes, it sometimes takes it’s toll, but *every single drop of sweat, blood and tears* is worth it. ~ Not one drop is wasted en route.
~ Sing your ‘blues’ in the bath, but sing your songs of encouragement on the streets!
(c:
We are not to be undone!
We do, after all (actually) have the powerful forces of LIGHT on our side, -whilst the other side is only lit by a guttering, chimerical Mad Fool’s candlepower, -courtesy of the transient powers of darkness…
And if you ever feel like giving up, just call this number: 2898%0853#8583z138,
-and give yourself a good talking to!
Chairman Mao was no fool. As most of us can recall, he said: “Political power grows from the barrel of a gun.” It doesn’t grow from typing electronic messages, no matter how intense those messages are. The American war machine will be checked by other war machines, not by liberal or progressive people venting their outrage in text. The age of the neocons will end only when “our” military forces are defeated in the field. They are close to defeat in Iraq. The Iran invasion will finish them off. We can then begin paying reparations and turning the criminals over to the Hague. At least we will know this is something we had to go through to arrive at a better understanding of how thoughts work.
Wishfullthinker and Madlib,
“I can’t physically go to Washington ect. but I have been making simple posts to unrelated websites. If the site has nothing to do with progressive politics, it is a good place to post to.”
You’ve both raised some very, very important points. It’s the big question: What the hell do we do? It’s an all-to-obvious question, but one central to our rapidly worsening situation _ which has left the realm of philsophical disagreement and entered that of material damage to the lives of people in the States and worldwide.
Americans have never in our history had to deal with such a vicious, ruthless, efficient and dangerous machine of malfeasance and repression. And one with such incredibly strong public backing _ even from the people it hurts the most. We have never faced such a hard fight for our freedoms. There is no historical precedent.
We simply don’t know how to handle it.
Posting here may be a bit of preaching to the choir. But I’m afraid posting on Conservative sites is preaching to the devil.
Those people simply hate us. If we started questioning “climate change” tomorrow, the Right would suddenly do a 180 and insist it’s all true. And find a religious angle. If we opposed abortion rights, they’d be for them. They run largely on hate for you and me, not on any logic or reason, or even on self-interest, despite their fake Libertarian Ayn Rand fetish.
You’re definitely right. It’s time to focus on the fight. Maybe it would be wise to take a lesson from the enemy. MoveOn claims about 3 million members, while the Society of American Evangelicals claims about 30 million. Guess which one calls Bush or one of his office staffers calls for advice every Monday morning.
I believe we are all open to ideas on how do handle this, and Common Dreams is a great venue for discussion. We just need to be more productive, realistic and focused.
Operation Saudi hypocrisy part 2.
not only did they wage war on countries other than where the majority of the 911 hijackers came from, now they are ignoring Saudi aid to the conflict and focusing on Iran. What a huge pile of B.S.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2006-12-08-saudis-sunnis_x.htm
The war powers act will allow him to do this sans Congressional interference for at least 60 days without a formal Congressional declaration of war. (Why the hell is this in our Constitution?)
And since Pelosi and Conyers have stood down on impeachment, they’ll be taking blame as well.
When the economy goes in the toilet, at least their may be a chance for an executive legislative overhaul, if world war 3 hasn’t brought most of the world to it’s knees.
sleep well all
If Cheney does end up nuking Iran’s facilities, only the most ignorant a-hole will still be claiming that it is inappropriate to compare Bush and Cheney to Hitler. They will have completely earned that comparison if they use nukes.
Agreed, “political power grows from teh barrel of a gun”. And, while the US get defeated in teh battlefield, we can all do our small parts to quietly throw monkey wrenches in the economy here at home. Be creative.
HIstory repeating itself, the French collabrating with the Nazis.
CeeMiracle & UN-common-dreams
Thanks for the link to Dr. Bowman’s “Open Letter to the New Generation of Military Officers Serving and Protecting Our Nation”.
I think it’s an excellent beginning of “something to do”, and we need to go farther. If the US is attacked in retaliation for bombing Iran, there would of course be a draft, and we’d no longer be in a position of much choice, particularly the young. I think Bush would use nuclear weapons in a minute, and Iran may receive nuclear weapons aid from some of their allies, like Russia, China, or Pakistan. I think we stand at the most dangerous time of human history.
Anti-war groups need to set up centers NOW to advise draftees about the Geneva Conventions and all international laws pertaining to war BEFORE they are drafted. They might also advise them to refuse a draft call and be willing to spend time in prison rather than be drafted. I think we’d need protection here at home, too, if Iran and its allies choose to retaliate here. Those who don’t want to go kill people in the ME might be willing to defend the US within its own borders. We haven’t had a war on our soil since the Civil War, but it may come to that if Iran decides to retaliate against the US on US soil. I THINK they’d retaliate against US forces in the middle East, but who knows?
I do wonder how much more America can take of Bush’s murderous actions before there is open rebellion and violence against the administration. We need some unified direction to move in that is nonviolent and more productive than posting on forums. An AWFUL lot of people seem to be reaching the end of their rope.
Anyway, I think we’re at a precipice about a LOT of things and wish I were younger so I had the energy to do more.
I just want to say in defense of us Americans to the many bloggers here who sound like they are not from the US and blame us “sheep” for not getting a gang together and goin to Washington and arresting and stringin up the whole bunch.
Before you jump on us, the ones who are trying to save your ass too…(nuclear war will end your party too)….what has your country done about all this …ask yourself what you have done besides trash those of us who try to save our little planet and the remaining life we have here?
What have you and your nation done and what are you now doing?
ForUs,
Jim
“What other country would be stupid enough to ally with him. England certainly wouldn’t especially with Tony now out of there.”
Well , today’s news has the French Foreign Minister , clearly and unequivocally , declaring that his country is prepared to support an attack on Iran if need be .
Even the French ,it seems ,have finally come around. Therefore can the Brits and the Germans be far behind -with their frenzied whelps and their frantic ‘me toos’.
All vying for the numbah one spot in the good graces of GWB and Cheney.
Time for everyone to wake up….we’ve been trapped in this maniac’s “Messianic” fantasy. He wants to be the President to bring about those biblical myths.
The only recourse available to the American people is impeachment and imprisonment of the Bush regime. These thugs are not going to stop their belligerence until they are either forced or voted out of office (the former is preferable), and they will continue to ignore the will of the people because they hold us in the same contempt that they hold anyone else who opposes their fascist worldview.
The Democratic Party are indeed appeasers: They are appeasing a maniac in the office of President who should be locked up for his massive war crimes. How long are we going to stand for this shit?
Imagine if England in 1776 had waged a war on its most powerful colony, the US, couched in the argument that it wasn’t to control a valuable resource or ensure the flow of taxation/tribute back to the Crown.
But if it was couched, ostensibly, in terms of denying America some technology.
Nonsense, isn’t it? So does Cheney/Bush REALLY think that it’s possible to permanently keep a particular technology out of a country, to keep them from both developing it in-house, to keep them from buying it, to keep any of their friends from doing the same? And not just this once, but permanently — by rule of force?
There is no sustainability to the neocon plan for Empire.
Looks like Sarkozy is replacing Blair as lapdog.
If the USA bombs Iran, I hope that the Americans who are most responsible will have fatal heart attacks on the same day.
“ask yourself what you have done besides trash those of us who try to save our little planet and the remaining life we have here?”
We’ve done the same as you, protested, wrote letters, signed petitions, but really do you expect your govt. to take any notice of foreign opinion when they disregard it’s own citizens? And not all of you are trying to save our little planet, Is it that us foreigners are not allowed to critise? I’m from Britain your poodle, luckily we don’t have Tony anymore and hopefully that will make a difference, and I’m sure that not all americans are ‘Sheeple’ but if you are going to be so sensitive, maybe you shouldn’t read the comments.
Anney says: “I do wonder how much more America can take of Bush’s murderous actions before there is open rebellion and violence against the administration. We need some unified direction to move in that is nonviolent and more productive than posting on forums. An AWFUL lot of people seem to be reaching the end of their rope.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~
For most, Anney, they will not be moved until they are really hurting and are touched personally - and even then it takes time for pain to turn into outrage and action. Sometimes it never does and just becomes a bitter, fearful place.
For others, they will go into denial … much like now … and go on with their lives as though nothing is happening … and they won’t want to find out.
For others of us here … yes, it is the choir, but there are stronger stirrings now and ideas being suggested right on these boards, and I think more and more of us realize we have to take some kind of action that counts for the long haul.
Someone in the above essays said … go talk to people locally who are ignorant of any facts, perhaps resistant, and depending where you live, there usually is some place to meet for free or low cost, … so take a provocative headline or question and make simple posters that a discussion meeting is going to take place … OUR NATION IS IN TROUBLE … 9-11, the economy, the Iraq War and maybe an Iran War … invite people to a place and with a time just to talk about it. If two show up, that’s a start.
Start a phone tree with friends to call people through the phone book or election board lists of voters to inform them about a meeting and personally invite them.
I have clearance now for a meeting in our own little Town Hall … and I’m going to go ahead and see what I can get going again. This is a Republican, conservative, religious right area, but not all …
People are shy about talking … depending where you live … so in a meeting respect for others’ opinions and the whole tone is important.
Education and information is so crucial, and people get amazingly creative, given half a chance.
And then, of course, historically, when things get really bad … and let’s hope they don’t … but when they do, there are always the resistance fighters … and their networks that make it possible to selectively gum up the works.
So many DVD films are available now … at library’s, for free on the internet or for low cost.
Gathering people to watch a documentary before a discussion … Seeing is believing …
Write a provocative question with websites listed that are appropriate that answer the question, and type and repeat the above to fill an 8 1/2″ x 11″ page; then print and cut up the “strips” and stand in front of a supermarket, smile, and hand them out. People usually don’t mind a little strip of paper and sometimes are intrigued and stop to talk.
There’s so many little ways, Anney, and you are never too old to be a kindly, mover-and-shaker agitator for truth and to try to correct some terrible wrongs.
Begin … It’s empowering to commit and just start with one simple action you can stick with for a time. You’ll find cronies. Guaranteed. And all you need are one or two to start rolling the rock down the mountain.
Google sites on activism … and you’ll find some that have organizing/idea kits to download that you can use locally.
We are the non-violent underground that needs to spread the news and cause the huge boulder that is poised to roll and crush us to roll in a different direction. Such naughty images that evokes! … where it lands.
But also, the choir is necessary, for support and relief to vent our frustrations, and for ideas.
So GO FOR IT, ANNEY … The Power of One Drop joined with other drops becomes the Mighty River with strong currents that can bring positive change.
peace …
People reaching the end of a rope…
The power of one drop… (and a sudden jerking stop)
NOW WE’RE TALKIN’ SOLUTIONS!!!
Texas old school.
Chickenhawks coming home to noose.
To: Un-Common-Dreams & Anney
Thanks for posting the alternative site to www.thepatriots.us with the powerful letter:
“An Open Letter to the New Generation of Military Officers Serving and Protecting Our Nation.”
Contacted Bob Bowman, the retired Lt.Col., U.S. Airforce [ret.] abut the patriots site print very hard to read. He or someone is working on it.
I downloaded a .pdf file and that’s fine.
But the Oregon Truth Alliance site you recommended is also a very wonderful newsletter.
www.oregontruthalliance.org/?q=node/178
“An Open Letter to the New Generation of Military Officers Serving and Protecting Our Nation.”
And Anney, this is a good piece to print out and plan a meeting to discuss. Wake-up call.
And have coffee available and teabags and hot water.
anon
Stinger, Cee Miracles, & Un Common Dreams
Yes, I’ve been growing impatient with the number of petitions and letters I’ve signed, expressing my outrage on blogs and wonderful sites such as this one. I’ve done these things with some kind of expectation that the government or at least my representatives will pay attention after the 2006 elections. To the disgust and outrage of most of us, the Democrats are giving Bush everything he wants, including permission to attack Iran, in violation of international law.
So that route of opinion-expression no longer works to satisfy my motive for doing it in the first place. It’s been futile.
It IS time for solutions, and maybe a lot of them, work on several fronts all at the same time, while remaining aware that we’re facing an enormous task. The government didn’t listen to the Vietnam War protesters either, and several protesters died at the hands of the government, so a country in revolution against its government’s illegal actions is not always safe for those who object, even peacefully. To go up against the government and a complacent population requires courage and conviction.
But there IS a place for everyone who objects, from letter-writing to town meetings to handing out brochures, to some other very good attention-getters.
I agree that it’s really time to stop complaining and do something, since nobody listens to the complaints.
Please read the article again, this time more critically.
It would indeed be enlightening to the readership if Common Dreams briefly posted its own comment immediately following each article.
This article is another Bush war propaganda appearing this time, of all the places, on my favorite site, Common Dreams, aimed at progressives. It repeats Bush’s unsubstantiated claims of Iran’s supposed troublesome involvement in Iraq. It is also furthering exactly the same scheme that Rice is reported to have wanted, namely:
“Miss Rice’s bottom line is that if the administra