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Joe Lieberman: How About Another War?
WASHINGTON - Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman, who began openly and aggressively angling for a war with Iraq just weeks after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, is using the thwarted Christmas Day attack on a Northwest Airlines flight as an excuse to open a new discussion about a new war.
Lieberman, the neoconservative solon who wanted to be the Secretary of Defense in the administration of John McCain (his 2008 candidate for president) and who would gladly play the same role in the administration of a Sarah Palin or any other saber-rattling Republican, is proposing the launch of a new preemptive war on Yemen.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the 23-year-old Nigerian accused of attempting to explode a plastic device aboard a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit on Friday, has told authorities that he traveled to Yemen to link up with al-Qaida operatives.
Lieberman admitted that in a Fox New interview that he was "not sure" whether the Nigerian succeeded in making contact with the individuals he "reached out to" in Yemen.
But "not sure" is good enough for Lieberman.
So, he says, it is time to start lobbing bombs -- lots of them.
"Iraq was yesterday's war, Afghanistan is today's war," chirped the senator. "If we don't act preemptively, Yemen will be tomorrow's war."
Lieberman, who never served in the military and whose over-the-top hawkish views have led his wiser colleagues to keep him off committees that deal with issues of war and peace, seems to be aware that "acting preemptively" in the manner he suggests, is an act of war.
What's the alternative? Doing what the Bush-Cheney administration failed to do. By working with the international community and employing smart diplomacy and policing strategies, the U.S. might well be able to address concerns about what is happening in Yemen... and Somalia... and Nigeria and a host of other countries.
Of course, Lieberman does not have much taste for smart diplomacy or policing strategies, as is obvious from his hamhanded tenure as chair of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.
Perhaps instead of getting all excited about starting another war, Lieberman would do better to focus in on the fact that the troubles on Christmas Day did not exactly reflect positive on the homeland security operations for which he is supposed to provide oversight and guidance.
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Show All"Iraq was yesterday's war, Afghanistan is today's war," chirped the senator. "If we don't act preemptively, Yemen will be tomorrow's war."
On a strictly practical level, where is Likud Lieberman going to get the troops? The only possible answer is the reinstatement of the draft. So go ahead, bring back the draft and see what happens. And then after Yemen there's any number of other nations these terrorists can shift their operations to. But hold on. First, we'll have to hear from Tom (Tough Hombre) Friedman. After he weighs in, President Blanc de Noir will have his marching orders.
GI Joe Lieberman never met a war he didn't like, or a progressive domestic policy that he liked.
The next time Democrats blame Ralph Nader for costing Gore the 2000 presidential race, remind them that GI Joe was Gore's running mate.
The next time Democrats blame Howard Dean or others for their pathetic excuse for health care reform, remind them that they brought GI Joe in to close the deal.
Sore/Loserman is another cold sore who just won't go away. He is a chicken-hawk for war because his state's top export is weapons to both sides of a conflict. He wasn't satisfied just looting the US treasury and forcing everybody in the country to buy his state's shitty insurance in the Obamacare scam, now he wants another holy war.
This guy is a government cancer and we have to cut him out.
TJ
"All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent." - Thomas Jefferson
I find the whole thing very convenient;the blokes have him on no fly we dont;the feds threaten the blokes over guantanamo and their investigation and this?We need something to scare the people with and more war.What wont the dc crowd do to keep the people in a state of panic and fear?They will pull anything.This guy was inept and of course he came from yemen and al qaida confirms it.How come we did not get bin laden to confirm it too?What bullshit.Tony
Where is the Terminator when we need him?
Answer: In California working on water.
The same Terminator who vetoed legislation to create a single-payer health care system in California? Such a program would have been larger than Canada's and hastened the demise of private insurance nationwide.
The same Terminator who vetoed legislation that would have prohibited Monsanto from monopolizing crop seed in California?
GI Joe Lieberman and Terminator are kindred spirits.
In response to this article, I would recommend reading Justin Raimondo's article on Anti-War.com. I am inclined to agree with Raimondo that there is much more to the Northwest Airlines Flight 253 incident than we are being told. This article illuminates part of the truth behind the incident. With Joe LIEberman at the helm, you can be sure war will take place somewhere in the world.
"Perhaps instead of getting all excited about starting another war, Lieberman would do better to focus in on the fact that the troubles on Christmas Day..."
No, Lieberman would do better to leave politics, go back to Israel, and take his bed-wetting buddy Rahm Emanuel with him.
Thank you for the info on Flight 253.
Most of all, thank you for the wonderful last sentence in your article. I love it!
No, Lieberman would do better to leave politics, go back to Israel, and take his bed-wetting buddy Rahm Emanuel with him.
Don't forget Obama. As a Jew with a computer and a color printer, I am perfectly willing to make a certificate (framed) "officially" proclaiming FUBARack H. Blanc de Noir an orthodox Jew. Some paste-on payes and a black fedora and he's In Like Flynn. Does anyone know if Blanc de Noir has seen "A Serious Man"?
I keep trying to tell people on the Obama-lovefest boards that Obama is totally simpatico with Rahm and he called Lieberman a mentor, helped get him re-elected in 2006, and when the some Dems wanted to strip him of his committeeship right after the 08 election Obama stood up for him again -- Obama's pal Lieberman. I don't get why the GOP doesn't love all these of these guys.
The GOP has loved these guys since Nov. 2006 when Nancy Pelosi put the for sale sign up and declared "impeachment is off the table".
Now that Congress loaded the stimulus bill with tax cuts and loaded the health care reform bill with corporate welfare, and passed both without any Republican votes, the Republicans can lay blame for the flaws in both bills on the Dems and use that as ammo against the Dems in the 2010 elections.
Obama lovefesters are victims of a terminal denial epidemic. Unless the US experiences a widespread epidemic of anti-incumbant fever in the 2010 elections, the Obama lovefesters and neocons will drag the US into a pit that it will never dig out of.
Here's the url for the article gracchus recommends:
http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2009/12/27/the-lap-bomber-mystery/
Thank you for the link, where we can read the testimony of passenger Kurt Haskell, who was on the same flight with Umar.
Haskell and his wife were playing cards at the check-in counter in Amsterdam when a well-dressed man accompanied Umar to the counter and said that Umar needed to get on the flight but had no passport.
What? No passport? And he was allowed on the plane? I don't know the rules in Europe, but we all know that there is no way the U.S. would allow anyone (especially someone of color) into the U.S. without a passport, so there was no point in letting him board the plane. Was there?
Now the hunt will be on for Mister Xi.
I read this article -- good one. It all seems just too convenient.
Lieberman seems to be getting increasingly pathological by the day. Surely, he must be off his meds.
I expect there is a straitjacket somewhere that needs to make his acquaintance.
Please, would somebody air-drop Mr. Lieberman into the middle of Gaza?
Now that's just inhumane...to the residents of Gaza. Biological warfare can never be justified.
Reactionary Zionists would kill us all.
I made the mistake of watching the Sunday morning CNN and Faux News coverage and punditry about the abortive explosion on NW Flight 253 as it was landing near Detroit. The usual GOP politico suspects were proclaiming the incident a major catastrophe averted by sheer luck and quick thinking passengers, proof positive that the Obama administration is asleep at the switch when it comes to keeping America safe. And since this guy was linked to a radical immam who was linked to the Muslim US soldier who we all know did the Fort Hood shootings....... well, you get the picture.
But Joe Lieberman is completely missing it. We don't want to attack Yemen. We want to attack Nigeria!
Just think about it.
Nigeria's got oil. Nigeria's already got a vicious civil war underway, with innocent civilians caught up in the rape and pillage. Nigeria's got a corrupt central government. Nigeria has a big evangelical Christian/Muslim religious split. Nigeria has a history of tribal warlordism. Just like Afghanistan, Nigeria's part of the great arc of instability, a land in dire need of a set of Uncle Sam's training wheels to guide them on the path towards nation building that leads to the road to democracy. And did I mention that Nigeria's got oil?
This evil doer bought his ticket and got his visa in Nigeria. He flew from Nigeria to Amesterdam, and from there he flew on to Detroit (which is right near Dearborn, Michigan, where thousands and thousands of Muslims live).
I mean, what more proof do you need?
Maybe there really was a far reaching, Al Qaeda-inspired conspiracy linking NW Flight 253, the Predator drone attacks on Yemen the week before, and the Fort Hood shooting massacre that took place more than a month before that.
Maybe Osama bin Laden wants to sucker Uncle Sam again, into another quagmire in another theater of the war on terror, this time deep in central Africa.
Who knows? Strange things happen.
Regardless, it seems to me that Joltin' Joe's hawkish heart is in the right place as always, but he's really missing the forest for the trees - the glorious window of opportunity - that is opening up here, right now, before our eyes.
Iraq was yesterday's war. Afghanistan is today's war. Yemen is tomorrow's war.
I say real men want to march on to Lagos.
Bill from Saginaw
No. Not Nigeria, not yet:
Nigeria won't pump while it's in civil war. They're shooting themselves without the US paying them (or without the US paying them very, very much or sending very many people; zero involvement is unlikely just on GP).
So they can wait.
The game seems to be control and monopoly, not production. That's why the swineherds in Washington can claim success to some extent at some points between their own people. It's government money that's spent, not theirs. They money that comes to them they keep. The oil costs more because Iraq is not pumping, or not effectively. So they can sell Saudi oil at a premium today and hope to sell Yemeni oil tomorrow and Iraqi oil the day after -- destabilize them today, and knock them off and pump them dry one or two at a time.
What does he care? He doesn't!
As long as its not "Israelis" dying on the battlefield and Americans can be deceived and lied to into war in the Middle East to do Israel's bidding (especially when the number of Jews in the US military is at an all time low, numbering less than 2000), Lieberman couldn't care less.
Lieberman is an Israeli mole. It's not just that he cares more about Israel, rather, in every manner, he is an Israeli and works to further the cause of Israel - no matter the means. If he has to aim American guns and troops at every Arab nation, that is what he will attempt to do.
Right on the money, Ted.
Perhaps we should be grateful that the 2000 election was fraudulent. Al Gore as president likely would have had an "accident" in his first year, and V.P. Joe Lieberman would have been our president.
Lieberman has been looking very smug for a long time now. He's accomplished a lot toward the United States of Israel.
He's a really, really bad man, and it will be a good day when he is no longer a Senator of the U.S. of A.
/cm
Exactly right. Lieberman never was a true U.S. citizen.
ok forget lieberman. let's focus on president obomber. after all Yemen was his idea in the first place no? i mean he is the brilliant commander in chef who ordered the bombing of Yemen. this was meant to prevent or forestall a terrist attack. how long did it take before somebody tried to hit back? does obomber not understand that if you punch somebody on the nose, that person is MORE likely to punch you back?
right now we are living in a world made much more dangerous than pre- bushobomber. the more enemies you engage or threaten, the more likely it becomes that a successful terror attack will happen. barry the wonder boy is much worse than bush ever was. when he came to the white house he had left over occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq. So he escalated Afghanistan, then trained his loony gunsights on Pakistan, now Yemen and Somalia. and don't forget Iran.
somebody needs to get a grip here. we desperately need to stop dropping bombs on people. or even threatening to.
Look, why doesn't Joe get America to declare war on every country in the world that it doesn't already control by force or via economics. There can't be many of them.
Why pussyfoot around taking the world over country by country? Let's get the whole thing over and done with.
I'm practicing already to be an American: I've stopped thinking, I've become incredibly greedy, I watch television day and night, I can sing the first two verses of God Bless America and I drive a Ford.
P.S. I forgot. I've started going to Church again!
http://www.dangerouscreation.com
David G sez: "I'm practicing already to be an American: I've stopped thinking, I've become incredibly greedy, I watch television day and night, I can sing the first two verses of God Bless America and I drive a Ford."
***
You've gone above and beyond the call, friend. You really only need to know the first verse of 'God Bless America'.
Goebbels, perhaps you can enlighten me. Does God really bless America? I mean, are Americans really his Children like the Jews are?
Perhaps I should be an Israeli instead. But does that mean I'd have to kill Palestinians?
Life isn't easy, is it?
www.dangerouscreation.com
You have a witness!
Went to church with my mother-in-law on Christmas Eve. It was very nice and the sermon was heart-felt, modern, and vibrantly delivered. I was invited back for the Sunday service. Boy, oh boy, did I fall for that bate and switch! On Sunday I was told that two people cannot be considered a family because they don't have children. Apparently, my husband and I are totally useless in the view of the church. Oh, yeah. Should I ever have a child, I should get a young cow and a skin of wine and offer up my child to the lord.
Ima get right on that.
How About Another Pogrom Mister Lieberman?
The Senator from Aetna should volunteer to lead the way into Yemen. He is very courageous with other people's children. What other countries does he want to bomb, invade, destroy??
Shach,
It certainly wouldn't be China, India or Russia.....no matter how many lunatic terrorists came here from one of those countries and set off bombs. Lieberman's concern is protecting Israel from surrounding countries that may pose a threat.
Yes, he is very courageous with other people's children and families, as are many others on Capitol $$$ Hill.
I wonder why the schmuck Lieberman is still alive? Maybe it's the internet at fault... in the old days he'd just .....
Draft Joe!
Cicero: "Freedom is participation in power."
Connecticut and any opposition candidates and their backers willing to run against Lieberman in the next primaries: How about another Senator?
Okay I'm no joe fan but
1. It strikes me that Obamaphiles (the hypnotized masses) are using Joe as an escape goat (in the style of Moveon.org and many posts here)
2. I doubt the veracity of the conspiracy internet article. Anything can be printed on the internet or the interviewee might be traumatized and somewhat nuts. The conspiracy deal needs independent coroberation or at least a second witness.
3. Yemen is next door/a direct threat to Saudi interests. That's why US is tossing bombs. A better analysis of the warring parties, Yemen's economy (disappearing oil economy)etc would be a helpful to truly understand what's going on here.
And the Democrats still let Lieberman continue as chairmanship of the Homeland Security Committee.
Multiple wars and wars of aggression at any and all costs to the American people. This is the essence of the PNAC white paper, "Rebuilding America's Defenses" and exactly what we're doing.
Nobody talks about it because they're all for it, including the Democrats. So rather than freak the American people out with this fifty to one hundred year war plan that will bankrupt and destroy the welfare of the entire nation, they proceed in stealth to sell it incrementally using a manufactured bogeyman that can pop up anywhere the power mad, money grabbing, vote sellers, aka. Congress, needs them to be.
So here's something that's been rattling through my head for about ten years.
If Al Gore is assumed to be this all-enlightened and all-knowledgable prophet so tirelessly dedicated to the public good, why did the author of "Earth in the Balance" do NOTHING to further the cause of environmentalism when he had the bully pulpit as vice-president, and WHY THE F**K DID HE CHOOSE JOE LIEBERMAN AS HIS VICE-PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE? Do you really think that LIEberman, his one-time senatorial collegue, was an unknown quantity to Uncle Al? Could Al have merely been off his game a little during the Summer of '00? At the level of international politics, where NOTHING is ever done without serious deliberations if the ulterior motive is to gain as much power or make as much power as possible, the well-being of the people be damned? I don't think so....
If there ever was a circumstance which illucidates the collusion of the Repugs and the Dumbs (or more correctly, the farse that they are not one entity at the higher levels) it is this one, yet it seems like almost no one else has made the connection, and I don't understand why.
This article, and The Nation generally, represent the worst aspects of liberalism, especially the inability to see their own hypocrisy.
John Nichols supported and voted for Obama, the one that pledged to attack Afghanistan (Remember him Nichols?). And then Nichols says:
"By working with the international community and employing smart diplomacy and policing strategies, the U.S. might well be able to address concerns about what is happening in Yemen... and Somalia... and Nigeria and a host of other countries."
What Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria, and a host of other countries need is for the U.S. to stay the fuck out of Africa, to halt its aggressive militaristic empire building policies. It is precisely this kind of liberal imperial claptrap that justifies our aggression no matter which party is in power.
It's why Chris Hedges writes articles about "Why Liberals are Useless", and it's precisely because they use pretty euphemisms that get translated into bullets on the other side of the planet, killing countless women and children, and over 1 million in Iraq (his beloved Democrats voted for all the war spending Bush ever needed).
It's time we start be honest about these sheep in wolves clothing.
And why is anyone surprised about what comes out of Lieberman's mouth? Of course he would say idiotic things, that's what he gets paid to do.
Classic liberals like Jesus, MLK, Lennon and Einstein should not be confused with neoliberals like Lieberman. Cons have been successfully demonizing libs for many years. So much so that liberals accept their lies.
To Einstein's credit, he was a socialist.
Spot on, agitkid.
The only way "Chickenhawk" Joe is gonna stop his warmongering is by "arming to the teeth" him and his neocon buddies like William Krystal, and Richard Pearle,......and parachuting them in the middle of the "action" over Yemen.
Why, I could almost hear them yelling, "GERONIMO!" already.
(LOL)
Abe, let's be charitable because it's the Festive Season. Let's just drop them from a plane over Gaza without parachutes.
I'm sure the Gazans will give them a decent burial, perhaps in a latrine!
Obama vows to use power to thwart terrorists
rather than understanding, compassion and respect.
Watch "The Battle of Algiers" to see how his way will turn out.
As I came in this morning the announcement was made on News 12: "Obama vows to prevent any further attacks against the U.S." We all know what that means.
"did not exactly reflect positive on the homeland security operations for which he is supposed to provide oversight and guidance"
Oh yes, LIE-man's words/actions DID reflect positively. Any action taken against the will of the people will delight the elitevil on the right, the only ones LIE-man answers to.
You may help insulate the extremevil cabal from obligation by continuing to vote elite candidates in the elections, and buying the elites' warez. They are depending on you so don't let them down.
Wouldn't you love to see Kristol and Lieberman trying to figure out the D-ring's on their chutes as they plummeted to earth?
Better yet, which end of the scope they should look through on their M-4's!