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Today is the deadline for U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraqi cities. But don't expect a great deal to change. "The original intent of moving troops out of the cities was to reduce the U.S. military role and send the message to Iraqis that the United States would be leaving the country soon," write FPIF policy outreach director Erik Leaver and FPIF contributor Daniel Atzmon in A Withdrawal in Name Only. "But troops that are no longer sleeping in the cities will still take part in operations within Iraqi cities; they will serve in 'support' and 'advisory' roles, rather than combat functions. Such 'reclassification' of troops as military trainers is another example of how the United States is circumventing the terms of the SOFA agreement."
[In Full, with information about the Honduran coup as well]
"'Two infantry battalions of the Honduran Army have risen up against the illegitimate government of Roberto Micheletti in Honduras. They are the Fourth Infantry Battalion in the city of Tela and the Tenth Infantry Battalion in La Ceiba (the second largest city in Honduras), both located in the state of Atlintida (sp?).'" [In Full @ NarcoNews]Essentially what's happening is the people of Honduras elected Zelaya but the Honduran legislature is still controlled by the oligarchy, who had, if not direct involvement in the coup, vested interest in seeing that Zelaya was removed from power despite his democratic installation as the nation's leader. The military? They tend to come from the working class (at least the 'grunts on the ground' with guns do), not the upper classes, and are always the wild card in any Latin American coup. We are seeing The Venezuelan anti-Chavez coups redux, with OR without US involvement, which at this time is an unknown.
The return of the coupComplete, with links, at FP Passport
Mon, 06/29/2009 - 12:21pm
The Wall Street Journal's Mary O'Grady argues that the ouster of Honduran President Manuel Zelaya was not in fact a coup, since the president was himself holding a referendum in violation of an order by the country's supreme court. But I don't think one need defend Zelaya to argue that sending troops to break into a president's house and put him on a plane out of the country is generally not the best way to protect "the independence of institutions that keep presidents from becoming dictators."
If this weekend's coup seems like a bit of a throwback to the Cold War era, that's because it is...
One day after the country’s president, Manuel Zelaya, was abruptly awakened, ousted and deported by the army here, hundreds of protesters massed at the presidential offices in an increasingly tense face-off with hundreds of camouflage-clad soldiers carrying riot shields and automatic weapons.
The protesters, many wearing masks and carrying wooden or metal sticks, yelled taunts at the soldiers across the fences ringing the compound and braced for the army to try to dispel them.One Honduran had this to say about it:
“We’re defending our president,” said one protester, Umberto Guebara, who appeared to be in his 30s. “I’m not afraid. I’d give my life for my country.”
In Washington, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the last senior member of the administration to visit Honduras, just three weeks ago, said that the United States was working toward “full restoration of democratic order (emphasis on 'Weasel words' mine) in Honduras.”
She said that the situation in Honduras “has evolved into a coup.” But when pressed by a reporter, she refused to say explicitly that the United States was demanding that Mr. Zelaya be returned to power, [In full, Protesters Confront Soldiers After Coup in Honduras (NYTimes)]
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Withdrawal in name only... Part 1: 35 - 50,000 US troops and *132,610* mercenaries staying in-theater
Part 2, and apropos to the story: US says it's not barred from using mine-resistant armored vehicles during daytime in Iraqi cities after Wednesday, July 1 2009... The so-called 'withdrawal' deadline"
Unfortunately, the reality is more amorphous, if not deliberately confusing, like much of Obama’s foreign policy and war strategy these days."
It's easy to see we're staying (In Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East/Central Asia... until EVERY drop of oil is sucked from Iraq's soil.
If everyone expects to be able to drive to work in a society that is utterly car (individualized transport for fearful-of-the-'other' people) dependent, there IS no other current option.
A fellow named Dimitry Orlov (of the blog Club Orlov) did a presentation a while back, comparing the social fallout from economic collapse of the Soviet economy and what might portend for the US under similar circumstances.
We earned our livelihoods through the use of... EAT because of, OIL.
Excerpt:
"The food distribution system makes heavy use of refrigerated diesel trucks, transforming food over hundreds of miles to resupply supermarkets. The food pipeline is long and thin, and it takes only a couple of days of interruptions for supermarket shelves to be stripped bare. Many people live in places that are not within walking distance of stores, not served by public transportation, and will be cut off from food sources once they are no longer able to drive.
Besides the supermarket chains, much of the nation’s nutrition needs are being met by an assortment of fast food joints and convenience stores. In fact, in many of the less fashionable parts of cities and towns, fast food and convenience store food is all that is available. In the near future, this trend is likely to extend to the more prosperous parts of town and the suburbs.
Fast food outfits such as McDonalds have more ways to cut costs, and so may prove a bit more resilient in the face of economic collapse than supermarket chains, but they are no substitute for food security, because they too depend industrial agribusiness. Their food inputs, such as high-fructose corn syrup, genetically modified potatoes, various soy-based fillers, factory-farmed beef, pork and chicken, and so forth, are derived from oil,"
It's called "Social Collapse Best Practices", and it's quite good... covering the implications of how the US and the Soviets had chosen to develop their cities, housing, transportation systems, and agriculture... ALL intensively petroleum based in the US, leaving America quite economically vulnerable... from within, AND without.
The answer we've come up with?
Our best solution?
Victimize... the countries that have the oil, if they won't offer it to us in deals that are the best for us, and often, as in the case of the Niger Delta, impoverishes and poisons the inhabitants of the countries we get the oil from.
"...funding military programs at alarming levels and continuing the Bush administration’s military and intelligence invasion of what used to be civilian life.
The latest manifestation of this continuity came last week when Dennis C. Blair, Director of National Intelligence, announced plans to transform the Pat Roberts Intelligence Scholars Program (PRISP) from a pilot project into a permanent budget item. Blair also announced plans to establish a “Reserve Officers’ Training Corps” to train unidentified future intelligence officers in US college classrooms. Like students receiving PRISP funds, the identities of students participating in these programs would not be known to professors, university administrators or fellow students — in effect, these future intelligence analysts and agents would conduct their first covert missions in our university classrooms. Clickthrough to Alternet @ Gates Of Hell
A military coup has taken place in Honduras this morning (Sunday, June 28), led by SOA graduate Romeo Vasquez. In the early hours of the day, members of the Honduran military surrounded the presidential palace and forced the democratically elected president, Manuel Zelaya, into custody. He was immediately flown to Costa Rica. More from VenezuelaAnalysis
"No Government Arising from this Unconstitutional Interruption Will Be Recognized" - OAS Demands "the Immediate, Safe and Unconditional Return of President José Manuel Zelaya Rosales to His Constitutional Functions" in Honduras. More.From Stan Goff, Ex-S.O.G., Ex-Marxist, at Feral Scholar:
"Outside of the direct actors, we don’t know exactly what just happened in Honduras. But the spinning will start soon; and neither President Obama nor Secretary of State Clinton have called for the return of President Zelaya to his rightful office. They have made tepid statements of opposition to military takeovers and a return to “democracy” and “constitutionality.”
While we wait, I will share an older piece about the US-directed coup in Haiti (which Obama and Clinton apparently support) and the attempted coup — with US support — against the democratically elected government of Venezuela.
In 1994, when my last Special Forces team, Operational Detachment Alpha 354, entered the Haitian city of Gonaives, I along with three members of that detachment waded through a huge and agitated crowd to encounter four soldiers and two plainclothes death squad members about to fire into that crowd with M-1 Garands. They were surprised to see us, and we took advantage of that surprise to compel them to lay their weapons down and submit to arrest. One of the plainclothes gents hesitated to relinquish his weapon, and I came very near shooting him. I’m only being honest - knowing this will put some people off - when I say that I now wish I had gone ahead and pulled the trigger. In Full, with linkage
"All The News You Never Knew You Needed To Know ...Until Now." Prefer An MP3 Playlist? It's Here: [192kbps VBR 8:46 Minutes] Other Audio Formats Available [ Here ] Twitter This Commentary |
"All The News You Never Knew You Needed To Know ...Until Now." Prefer An MP3 Playlist? It's Here: [192kbps VBR 10:59 Minutes] Other Audio Formats Available [ Here ] Twitter This Commentary |
"All The News You Never Knew You Needed To Know ...Until Now." Prefer An MP3 Playlist? It's Here: [192kbps VBR 11:05 Minutes] Other Audio Formats Available [ Here ] Twitter This Commentary |
Three months after the United States successfully pressed the United Nations to impose strict sanctions on North Korea because of the country's nuclear test, Bush administration officials allowed Ethiopia to complete a secret arms purchase from the North, in what appears to be a violation of the restrictions, according to senior American officials. The United States allowed the arms delivery to go through in January in part because Ethiopia was in the midst of a military offensive against Islamic militias inside Somalia, a campaign that aided the American policy of combating religious extremists in the Horn of Africa.Self-serving Hypocrisy... That's what America is known for in the global community.
[In Full, Global Policy Forum reprint of a NYTimes article, April 7, 2007]
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According to one women’s rights activist, "women were highly active and present in the campaigns of the two reformist candidates as well as in campaign events and rallies. This signifies that women are willing to work toward the election of candidates who take their demands for equality and freedom seriously."The anti-Islamist Iranian ex-pats living in the US were involved in shipping 40,000 'video pens' to Iranian protesters. The Iranians found out and will be making 'examples' out of anyone found with one.
Their presence at the protests following the elections, according to this activist, "is a further sign that women know what is at risk - the right to self-determination - and women are willing to pay the price for a better future for themselves and their children."
While many young women turn out for protests, the presence of older women at these events is also easily observable. One woman in her fifties explained that the main reason she attends protests is to "lend support to the younger generation and to try to prevent any violence targeted at them."
She went on to describe how she was beaten at one protest when she physically intervened and tried to stop the assault of a young man by security agents.
Along these lines, a group of women calling themselves "The Mourning Mothers" issued a call for peaceful protests at Laleh Park at 7:00 on Saturdays, near the area where Neda was killed on Saturday, Jun. 20.
The statement reads: "Based on what sin have you murdered our children? Why have you forced all mothers into mourning?"
The mothers have demanded an end to violence, the prosecution of those who have committed violence, and the release of over 800 persons arrested over the past two weeks. [In Full]
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Riot police fired tear gas to break up an opposition rally in Tehran today after around 1,000 demonstrators defied a threat from the Revolutionary Guard to crush any further protests over the disputed presidential election.You think Iranian women are docile Chador-ed sheep? Here's video of a couple of traditionally garbed Iranian women (Now Iranian Riot Grrrls) in Tehran who KNOW what to do with a dumpster. (and if you think it's all fun and games, at the top of the page to the "Riot police fired tear gas" link above, is video of an Iranian woman dying on the ground after being shot at a demonstration.)
Police in helmets and wielding clubs fired at least seven rounds of tear gas and arrested up to 60 people at a rally in Haft-e Tir square, a popular shopping destination in the heart of Tehran, a witness said. [In Full]
An actual Navy destroyer ship called the “USS John McCain” has gone rogue and will soon attack North Korea, to get back at Charlie for good this time. [In Full]...and at president Obama's home port. Chicago, today will be the kickoff for a program called United We Serve, a program to coordinate the leadership of federal agencies with community leaders. "President Barack Obama is urging people to help in the nation's recovery by volunteering, everything from picking up trash to tutoring." As they say in the music industry, they're going to 'woodshed'. If they can't get it together on the 'tune' nationally.. see this commentary on the state of the US economy, A Snake Eating Its Own Tail, from Jim Kunstler @ Clusterfuck Nation:
June 22, 2009 7:59 AM[After the news, A little ditty about the 'Iranians'... and their 'Uraniums'... from Robert Lund, followed by a little social commentary about the old wave of 'post-modern' communication tools, Tell-Unh-Vision (Too bad it doesn't 'Tell A Vision'... closer to a recurring phantasm), by Ian Scholls. Courtesy of the respective artists and KVMR radio Nevada City California]
I'd like to know what Barack Obama thinks he's doing with the fiasco we call the US economy. He can't pump it back into the credit-fueled freak show it used to be, of course, but he could steer it in a practical new direction. Even people who have lost a lot, and stand to lose more, can be motivated to behave more self-beneficially. The president doesn't have very long before his economic problems become really awful political problems.
The current mass delusion that will go down in history as the "green shoots fugue" can't possibly bring the credit freak show back because the credit -- i.e. money borrowed from the American future -- was swindled away. Something like $14 trillion worth of nominal dollars is being sucked into a cosmic vortex never to be seen again. It was last seen in the spectral forms of so many collateralized debt obligations, credit default swaps, so-called structured investment vehicles and other now-obvious frauds.
That giant sucking sound we hear means the process is still underway, and the "money" disappearing into yawning oblivion will out-pace any effort orchestrated by the Federal Reserve and the US Treasury to replace it with new "money" (or credit). Therefore there is no chance between heaven and hell that the pre-2008 suburban homesteading and shopping fiesta can ever come back. The American polity is tapped out in all sectors, personal, corporate, and public.
Notice the two words largely absent from whatever public discussion exists around these matters -- "swindle" and "fraud." The reason they're missing is because if they happened to enter the conversation, something would have to be done about them, [In Full]
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Secretary Gates says the United States is watching North Korea's missile launch preparations "very closely" and he has ordered a new high-altitude missile interceptor system deployed to Hawaii, along with a floating radar system to provide tracking data.NASA is sending an unmanned probe named 'Centaur' to the moon and punch a hole in it looking for water (and colony sites). Nice... We've already dug holes in every available place on Earth, hostile and friendly (except of course our own back yard), and generally ravaged the planet we inhabit so now we're going to scavenge the moon.
"We do have some concerns if they [North Korea] were to launch a missile in the direction of Hawaii," said Secretary Gates. "I've directed the deployment again of THAAD [Terminal High Altitude Area Defense] missiles to Hawaii and the SBX [Sea Based X-Band] radar has deployed away from Hawaii to provide support. Without telegraphing what we will do, I would just say I think we are in a good position, should it become necessary, to protect American territory." [In Full]
Friday, June 19, 2009The US Senate passed the $106 BILLION dollar supplemental war spending bill (which BTW only funds our wars till September) yesterday and sent it to the White House for the president's signature, and did so without a permanent ban on the release of detainee abuse photos.
Mourning Rally Biggest Demonstration Since Monday in Tehran;
Khamenei to Address Nation
Thursday's march in Tehran was just enormous, several hundred thousand strong. AFP writes, "Many in the huge crowd walked silently and lit black candles as night fell. Others wore green wristbands or ribbons and carried flowers as they filed into Imam Khomeini Square, a large plaza in the heart of the capital named for the founder of the Islamic Revolution, witnesses said." The marchers wore black to show their mourning for the dozen reformers killed by security forces on Monday. Mir-Hosain Mousavi, whom the crowd has adopted as their leader, addressed them briefly. [In Full]
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