Refuge 8 September 2007
Posted by marisacat in Culture of Death, DC Politics, Iraq War, WAR!.trackback
Refugee camp – Baghdad – November 16 2004
Refugee camp – Baghdad – November 16 2004
Refugee camp for Fallujah residents – Habaniya near Baghdad – December 2004
Habaniya refugee camp – December 12 2004
Fallujah – November 23 2004
Families begin returning to Fallujah – December 23 – 2004
Siege Tactics and Attacks on Population Centers
Occupation forces have repeatedly targeted heavily-populated civilian centers in Iraq, including Fallujah, Ramadi, Tal Afar, Samarra, and Najaf, resulting in many civilian casualties and massive destruction of the urban physical infrastructure. During these operations, the US Coalition forces have also used siege tactics, such as cut off vital necessities, including water and medical supplies.
Atrocities and Criminal Homicides
US-led occupation forces have committed numerous atrocities in Iraq since the invasion of 2003. Haditha, Hamandiya, Sadr City, Samarra and Ishaqi have become synonymous with murder, rape and the multiple killing of civilians.
photos - Abol Khaseb – Fallujah Massacres – albasrah.net
In early production: My Lai movie to be reminder of war atrocities: [Oliver] Stone
catnip havent read it but its about canada and torture
How much more useless can they be?
Wow – just wow – this guy takes my breath away:
Islamofascism
#2. While the facts in that article are mostly true, I certainly wouldn’t take the extra leap that our country will move to legalize torture in any way – and especially not with a Conservative minority government that doesn’t have the power to do so (as much as its been covering for the Bush administration’s vile practices). The repression of rights that’s occurred since 9/11 is slowly being reversed through the courts and as a result of the Arar inquiry. There’s no way we’re going to backslide.
LA Times on OBama… seems a mixed piece. I did find some new info on page 2…
And, read a certain way, this is hilarious, Kilgore who is, iirc, friend to Armando-Tent-o-Rama — on NutRoots, Congress and IRaq.
4
LOL “bedsore brownshirts”
A really good one!
Wanted to pull a comment forward from the end of the last thread:
Wozzle
wozzle | |
Hi, all – and HB, catnip! I turned 55 in August, leonine as ever, still waiting for the Perseid meteor shower to do me justice…
Orange is in open revolt. One cannot promote Dems over there unless they’re unelected. Two rec’d posts I saw were by DHinMI and NPK; one was entitled “Scorn” regarding the abysmal Pelosi/Reid management of the political situation, the other was begging for the faithful not to lose faith, but to call their reps and sens.
I suspect that the days of political megablogs are done. Creating and maintaining blogs has become fairly easy (altho I wouldn’t have the time) and the levels of discourse have gone over the edge. Peeder’s PPF place is fun, but not political. Budy’s efforts appear to be going south. Both MLW and BMT are done.
Shocking, eh? I thought all bubbles were obvious – guess I was wrong.
Sep 8, 1:21 PM
******* close of comment **********
And in foxy fairness – LOL – here is Intermittent Bystander’s reply to wozzle:
Intermittent Bystander – 8 September 2007
wozzle – FYI: docudharma hasn’t even offically launched yet. They’re still in set-up mode. (Hence the daily design tweaks and heavy meta emphasis.) I think the Big Announcement is scheduled for next Wednesday. Right now, people are just drifting in. (And lucky me – I just registered as #99.)
Some bubbles are fairly persistent – they’ll float awhile, reaggregate, etcetera. It’ll be interesting (I hope) to see the arcs of the diaspora. And the sporadics.
But Modern Major General Monopoly days are over, I agree
While I was at IOZ, I see he writes another short note to Mam’zelle Digby.
It’s all good. Maybe the netcoots will still find the way to Nerdvana? I’d love to see the day when the internet has a truthscanner…
And as long as Armungus is a premier poster at Budy’s house, I won’t play poker there.
BTW, I’d love to know who IOZ is – the sunshot of the Golden Triangle makes me homesick. For those who have never been, the nightscape is even more impressive. Spouse and I are considering where to live after retirement; western PA is not a bad option.
wozzle
I agree, it is a beautiful shot of Pittsburgh PA
BTW, I’d love to know who IOZ is
Well he has dropped hints to his life. And some semi generalised things about his family, in general and his father with a bit more particularity.
The Blahgs tho, as he rendered some sharp commentary on Digby Atrios and others, came after him, some, lobbing those details.
Not sure what he may say in future.
#10 Marisa – yes, caught that one yesterday. IOZ has cleared up a mystery for me. While I’ve appreciated her writing for years, as far back as when she only posted at Eschaton, she’s never been on my must read list. Most of the time I forget to go over there and check out what’s for lunch. It was always nutritious but somehow rarely satisfying. Atrios more often gets to the beef in one line than she does with many graphs. Or more cynicism is just getting in my way.
Dennis Perrin has up a good ramble, from Miss NC to edumacation to parents are the problem to GulfWar 1, to falling out to get clean from despair (tho I notice he has had weeks of despair recently).
Don’t worry, it’s not that long.
One thing about da Burgh; it’s rather separated/insulated from the rest of the world. It’s Appalachia Urban. It was for many years the corporate center of the universe. Now most of its residents are “us against the world”, even more than when I was a kid.
Pittsburgh’s moral/cultural definition – October 13, 1960.
15
oh Digby has long been the exalted. I posted my issues iwth her during Alito, and have repeated it here.
Another exceptionalist, another Dem apologist and another link happy little minion. I happened to go thru weeks of her archives once, hunting for something she had written and noted what a link minion she is. She only links to bloggers,
A[sshole] list. And upper B[ullshit] List, shall we say. LOL
I am not a fan. But Armando was. And is I suppose.
Intriguing cheesecake (at the blog of a self-described “fiber fanatic”) for you-know-who, the birthday herb.
Dress the candidate! WW Bob Kerrey W?
Pardon my fripperies.
Dress the Librarian.
Some cheesecake and several paper dolls went to spam.
Pick an anthem and pound it out:
The speech is so damned leaden I could not bother to do anything iwth it, but the close is just too
too
too
too
icky.
Speaking of docudharma…
Don’t miss the comment, first up, to this post by nezua at Unapologetic Mexican
Special Report: Oil and Corruption in Iraq (Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Sept. 7).
#21 – just more suckiness. Derivative, watered-down, pruned, stripped of insight and bereft of the power of the originals just plain sucks. He’s merely mouthing words that his consultants have figured out appeal to a voting niche not being serviced by BarHill. But what really sucks is that many of those people haven’t figured out that he sucks as much as BarHill.
yeah
I have sliced and diced Edwards before (his Feb appearance on MTP, for one).
My guess, he will hang around for years entertaining ideas of this run or that. Never rising high enough for some real reporting on his soft focus story.
Typical.
Re: The tank battles in Gulf War I were the largest such post-World War II engagement.
The Battle of Medina Ridge, 27/2/91, was the largest tank battle in American history. The engagement was between the 1st Armoured Division and the 2nd Brigade of the Medina Division, part of the RG (fought just outside Basra).
I was one of the participants in the Battle of 73 Easting, 26/2/91, and was in the hard-fought action against the Medina Div. (with reinforcements from other Iraqi elements) beginning on 27/2/91 and running two days straight. 41 or 42 Iraqi tanks destroyed (I think that number is right, might be off by one or two) and an Iraqi division commander captured.
There is a persistent myth that the air campaign had destroyed the Iraqi ground forces and broken their will to fight. The tank battles and stiff Iraqi resistance would not have occurred if this were true; the Republican Guard were not only willing but well able to put up a fight. This experience should guide any US commander shaping an attack against Iran: the idea that air power alone can knock out Iranian ground forces and prevent them from seizing the south of Iraq (including Basra) is just plain nuts, and this time the US does not have the ground forces to kick the Iranians out. If the Iranians are willing to take the losses in personnel and equipment, they can seize Basra and the surrounding areas and hold it, perhaps indefinitely, even in the face of far superior American air power. This reason alone would dissuade a sane general from advising an air strike against Iran, and is the only reason I can think of why Bush and Cheney haven’t yet ordered a massive air strike against the Iranians, nor permitted the Israelis to launch one. The Iranians might also choose to deploy forces into the Kurdish region of northern Iraq, as well, a move the Turks might cautiously (and silently) approve. The enemy of my enemy is my friend and all that.
Not to bore everyone with details, but the Iraqi RGs were tough bastards, and not getting them on board with the new regime was the worst possible mistake in a veritable Grand Canyon filled with mistakes after the US and the UK invaded Iraq the second time around. And yes, the RG would have co-operated: they had position and privilege in Saddam’s regime, and to keep it, they would have done a deal (in fact, many of their commanders did in GW2, but got betrayed by Cheney’s stooge, Bremer).
That’s not to say that the long-term occupation of Iraq is workable in any way that would benefit ordinary Iraqis, merely that the RGs were more than happy to trade the increasingly erratic Saddam for a dictator chosen from their own ranks. The insurgency against the US occupation is quite rightly called the Revenge of the Republican Guard; one reason resistance has been slow to build was because the Iraqi people have no love lost for these former Saddam loyalists; however, once again…the enemy of my enemy….
Re: Digby. Read an essay she wrote–one essay, mind you–was quite underwhelmed and never bothered again. Anyone who gathers such fulsome praise from the WEBBies is automatically suspect to me, and of course reading what she had written only confirmed my suspicion. Digby’s much-vaunted writing is really just recycled party propaganda wrapped up in recycled conventional wisdom. Perhaps I’ve judged too readily and on too little available evidence, but I I don’t need to eat the whole apple to know if it’s rotten: one bite usually is more than sufficient.
Without knowing very much, this seems logical… as well as the supposition about Kurdish Iraq:
If the Iranians are willing to take the losses in personnel and equipment, they can seize Basra and the surrounding areas and hold it, perhaps indefinitely, even in the face of far superior American air power. —- ST
#28–
And what’s more, the Iranians could hold large chunks of Iraqi territory for a VERY long time. The only way the US could push them out would be to mobilise a very large ground force and suffer heavy losses in urban fighting on the streets of Kirkuk, Mosul and/or Basra. Urban combat has quite rightly been compared to a “knife fight in a phone booth”.
How could the US mobilise such a large ground force? Assuming Bush and Cheney could whip up political support for it at home, they’d have to draft another 200,000-300,000 into the army and train them. That’d take at least a year and quite possibly two to train, equip, and deploy those fresh troops–and all the while the Iranians would be holding, almost with impunity, two huge chunks of Iraq, with the US powerless to do a goddamned thing about it unless the President was willing to nuke the captured Iraqi cities.
The US could call on its European allies to supply troops, but the British Army has nothing left to contribute, and the Germans and French aren’t going to sacrifice ten or twenty thousand dead in Iraq–their people simply wouldn’t stand for it. The Turks would be fine with Iranian incursions into parts of northern Iraq, since it would give them an excuse to deploy their own troops inside Iraqi borders and declare open season Kurds. The US has no Arab allies to speak of, and would stand alone in facing the Iranians. Pushing the Iranians out of captured Iraqi territory would require a commitment of hundreds of billions of dollars, a renewal of military conscription, deployment of 300,000 ground troops, and take 2 or more years. The casualties would be horrific on both sides, with the US taking heavy losses as the Iranians and their Iraqi allies would have plenty of time to dig in for a protracted siege. At the risk of being labelled a war gaming pornographer, I’d say the US would lose 10,000-12,000 troops in the effort just in and around Basra, let alone Kirkuk and Mosul in the north.
All of which is the most logical explanation for why the long-predicted US attack on Iran hasn’t happened. However, I see that Bush and Cheney are quietly and quickly rotating senior officers opposed to an attack on Iran out of their positions and installing a bunch of Yes Men in their place–not a very good portent.
Consider how Fallujah was revenge for the deaths of Blackwater contractors, whose families are now being sued by Blackwater.If that doesn’t suggest the fuckedupedness of the whole thing, what does?
The commander out of CENTCOM who replaced Conyers as local top cop in Fallujah (cannot think of his name a heavy Xtian), let it slip that they planned to roll on Fallujah with or without the mercs.
I think the big issue is that Fallujah had a long history of resistance and insurrection. Against the British (from what I have read) AND against Saddam.
Some sort of annihilation war fare, to destroy it. What we do, it seems. And then all the other cities, villages and towns we applied the same brutal illegal process
There is no resurrecting America for me after these years ReaganBushClintonBush + Clinton The Bitch side of the bed running.. There was small hope that we wanted a modern future, after Civil Rights, after the small breathing space post Vietnam.
But our chosen reality is clear.
LOL
From SFKossacks. Check the right hand column under ”what we are about”. And who they channel.
Endless BlogFathering.
re: Digby and Hullaballoo, if I click over there, it’s to read tristero.
Thanks for the info on GW1, Shadow, in this thread and the last.
thanks also for the Dennis Perrin link (I really do need to remember to check in on him more often:
Amen, in a country where “My kid can beat up your honor student” is considered FUNNY … the parents and their bigotries and superstitions make a truly educational education … impossible.
I do not seek enforced equality. However, there has to be equality of opportunity
He is such a fucking dumbass.
He has admitted that he doesn’t read books and he didn’t like college. So it’s no surprise that he comes up with ridiculous idiocies like the above. What IS a surprise is that supposedly educated, intelligent people view them as pearls of wisdom from The Guru.
Spare me.
Moulitsas has the nerve to call himself a progressive and a liberal? But he’s a Libertarian Democrat.
Hm, Chauncey Gardener and Zelig rolled up into one, that’s Markos Carlos Alberto Moulitsas Zuniga, blogdom’s answer to the Vichy French.
36-CAMZ?
(raffle it off at MyLastsuicideNote)
My advice is for parents to carefully scrutinise their children’s school textbooks and to ask questions–daily–about what they’re taught. See what they’re being assigned for homework.
My own son was told bald-faced lies about American and world history. I set him straight on a number of accounts. My son had a right-wing “Social Studies” teacher who threatened to fail him if he persisted in the “liberal” version of history.
I went to the principal and got the kid transferred into a real class with a real teacher–but that teacher has influence over the minds of 200 young people a day, and he’s defiling those minds with lies.
Of course, the right-wing “Social Studies” (as opposed to “Anti-Social Studies”, I suppose) teacher is also called…COACH. And as coach has a winning record with the old sports team, he could teach the kids with Victoria’s Secret catalogues and the principal would kiss his feet.
I’m keen on sports myself, but I think they should be organised separately from the school. Hiring an unqualified person as a teacher just because he’s a good sports coach is inexcusable.
Another good Perrin piece:
Miss Devore:
In Latin American countries, it’s also wise when enquiring about someone’s identity to include their full name. Turns out (courtesy of Francis L. Holland Investigative Services) that Kos has an uncle Carlos Alberto, from which he’s gotten his two middle names.
And Dennis was there, YkosGagaLand. He knows.
One of the most drop dead funniest threads I ever read (speaking of the guy who changes your transmission) was at WIndsock.
They were all very mystified, but very angry, over wrenches in the deal, when they had work done at their houses.
So many blocked toilets. They’d call the plumber who would unearth masses of broken tile chips slammed into toilets.
There were 3 coments about that, and other “side work” they were victims of… 2 comments about trashing that occurred, drains and what have you that was trashed…
I was laughing out loud thru it.
They were so mindlessly angry. Not having figured it out – at all.
SV – my exact same response – thanks for sparing me the need to think about it long enough to write it down.
Shadow – you’re approaching the whole Iranian thing with too much information and logic. Bush/Cheney and probably most of the Pentagon still believes that air wars work – that all the problems in the past weren’t due to the limitations of air power but because not enough air power was used. That might be why they haven’t taken nukes off the table. They’ll be light on the ground forces in place to repel any Iranian incursion into Iraq, but my guess is that they’ll move into Iran before Iran launches a counterattack. My other guess is they’ll pull in every body possible from every base in the world including inside Iraq, some arriving before the attack and others if needed after the attack.
Their game is simply to hit Iran so hard that a response would be weak and slow to materialize. Can’t say that in the short run that it won’t have the appearance of success.
Ah, American textbooks, which have declined in quality and fact even more than when I was being forced to “learn” from them back in the ’60s. I was an avid reader, before I even started kindergarden, and I LOVED the stories about the westward expansion, brave cavalry fighting Indians and such, not understanding that those “savages” were by blood too.
Then I read “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” when I was in fifth grade, on my own.
I remember being crushed and betrayed … I truly loved school, loved history segments in class … and they’d been fucking LYING TO ME. My road to angry malcontent began.
Yes, kids can get a more balanced view of our history, but they have to do it on their own, or w/ the help of family or friends. How many bother, or have access?
Of course, the right-wing “Social Studies” (as opposed to “Anti-Social Studies”, I suppose) teacher is also called…COACH. — ST
This, as I understand it, was a tactical decision in the dumbing down process. Not a recent one eiither.
In school all I was taught about Mexican history was Pancho Villa. Then I went to Mexico City on business in my 30s and went to the museum in Chapultepec castle, brought by my taxi driver who was giving me a “basic tour” of the city’s sights. He walked me through the whole museum and explained the major events of Mexican history to me. I was actually in tears by the end. There’s so much we are never told here, even those of us with very highfalutin expensive educations.
LOL
They have not called me sane, not yet.
The Shock Doctrine Short Film
Telecom Giants Trying To Block Free Internet
ST –
I remember that. Mine was so fucking right wing. LOVED LOVED LOVED Reagan. It was 82-3 ish. He hated those commie bastards.
I was going to teach a few years back. Before I went thru the tedios application process I started checking the job listings. EVent though there was supposed to be a “shortage” every postion was Academic/Sport. Chemistry/Tennis History/Swimming. So my graduate level history studies of late 19th Century america were not as important as my backswing.
#46–Ah, the much-anticipated rapprochement and group hug in the WEBBies begins. Armado, MSOC, and other malcontents (well, not EVERYBODY), come on home! All is forgiven and forgotten! Here, have some blogads and a nice big glass of attention…now go kick the stuffing out of anybody who dares question the Democrats!
That’ll be a ringing endorsement:
The Democrats might be some corrupt worthless motherfuckers, but they’re OUR corrupt worthless motherfuckers!
Oh yeah, that’s the stuff.
finding it easy to live like a pimp:
http://sfkossacks.net/showDiary.do?diaryId=9
Intriguing cheesecake
Wow! Now that’s original.
Robert F. Kennedy once said that each time we stand up for an idea, we send forth a tiny ripple of hope, and that, together, those ripples can build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.
Mr kos, tear down that wall!
#47 & 48 – MitM – Thanks for the Shock Ttmt link. Good short.
re: free WiFi – my understanding is that it’s so cheap to provide that it’s stupid to leave this in the hands of the private sector. San Antonio has installed it. Philadelphia was going to but that has gotten all bolloxed up and if they get there, it’s not going to be “free” but subscriber fee based, cheaper than phone or cable but far more than the actual cost.
Re Islamofascism
Since I first heard it several years ago, it has always felt jarring in a way I could never completely explain to myself. The claim that it was possible to lump two utterly unrelated categories as bizarrely distant as “Iran ” and “Contra” seemed utterly fantastical. On one side of this looney equation you have european fascisms including the ibero/american versions of Franco/Salazar/Getulio Vargas/Peron y Peron and the endless stream of pathetic generals from Castelo Branco through Pinochet , while on the other side the belief system and diverse culture of a vast swath of humanity.
Yes of course, this A=B is so logical and powerful: even civilized, ideologically correct opponents of these pathetic dictators can now join hands with the power-wielding, masculine, no-nonsense defenders of our western civilzation, We on the left should have common cause (say they), and accordingly there you see Hitchens off to do battle with his rallying cry, listening no doubt to Harvey Mansfield talk about manhood.
Such an intoxicating force, that’s it, go ahead murder and pillage and be virtuous while you’re at it.
WiFi
Newsom stalled and stalled and stalled and stalled, on a system of Wifi for the poor. And everything he danced with seemed purposefuly proglematical…
Finally a grassroots org took it over and did it. Got it going anyway, in several districts. (if I can find an easy google on it will post a link)
I assume that is going on elsehwere as well.
Brian De Palma wins Best Director award at Venice with ‘Redacted’
#52. I should probably clarify that one (or not, but I will). I meant that kos should tear down his site’s oppressive wall and stop resisting people who actually speak the truth (those he keeps banning).
Alrighty then. Carry on.
Shorter Major Danby: SYFPH
cheesecake.
long ago I read something about the origin of sour cream in Poland. I’m a huge fan of the sour. I love vinegar. Not a fan of sweet-except for berries.
My grandparents lived near the Sara Lee factory in Chicago. They bought the discards (bent packages) and that was how I came to have my cheesecake, eating it, too. No one has ever beaten their fudge brownies, either, IMO.
yeah, they had “pound cake”, too, but I’d never revisit that as an adult.
my last cheesecake was kiwi-topped.
I hate the fact that I have the worst kitchen ever in my life.
BBC map of Iraqi migration, circa January 07.
Iraq: The World’s Fastest Growing Refugee Crisis (Refugees International, August 29, 07).
Instant Armandharma.
Tie-dyed cheesecake from Disney’s Pop Century Resort.
#57 l-cat – I would prefer that he erect a virtual wall and list all the banned. That way new readers could look them up and decide who they would prefer to hang out with as well as learning how to become popular (not sure why that’s such a popular ambition among so many there). Also they should be forewarned that dKos popularity isn’t good for your mental health – many of spun out of control and landed in the dKos pit of shame and been banned and some have simply disappeared into the ethernet.
LOVE cheesecake. I made a Lindy’s version, every year for my mother.
*************
I don’t know where he is hanging now, but De Palma is another one, like Altman, he just decamped to Paris when Bush went in…
Refugees, psychedelic cheesecake, and Armandharma in spam.
lol. Whoops.
More My Left Drama om aisle 4.
mmmmmmm, cheesecake.
btw way, I know it’s very non-progressive of me, but I giggled like a schoolboy at “Shoot ‘Em Up” today. The most over-the-top, exploitive and tasteless anti-gun movie ever made.
I loved it.
SORRY!
TWO from catnip out of spam
and one from Int Bystander, also out of spam…
I think I like Dharmando better
mmmmmmm, cheesecake.
Hey! Where’d they get that pic of me doing my Vanna impression?
#59 Miss D – I remember that Sara Lee cheesecake from when I was a kid and it was wonderful. Either it or I changed because I didn’t like it that last time I bought one which was a long time ago. Not at all into the brownies – Baker’s unsweentened chocolate brownie recipe on the back is the best IMHO. Now the pound cake has to be toasted and served with orange marmalade. Advice probably like what I got from a friend once when I said that Pop-Tarts was one of the vilest American concoctions. She told me that I’d made the mistake of toasting it and they are tasty if not toasted. She’s wrong, still vile. The pound cake also works for the base of a quick trifle. A dessert with so much junk in it that the cake melds nicely into the fruit, jam, nuts, pudding and cream. A bit of rum or brandy sprinkled on the cake makes it even better.
I’m glad you liked it too, Marie. I liked Cuaron’s take on Wolf’s idea/connection btwn our criminal interogation techniques and our ruling class’ strategies of social control.
Richardson had some decent spam until about 1/2 down…..
The truth needs to be heard — and you can be the megaphone.
Please make a contribution of $35 today to help my campaign continue to get the truth out about Iraq in this critical time. Without you, our call to “GET OUT NOW” may be drowned out in all the noise and all the spin.
Well Bill…. It was abig topic at the repoop debate. Mr Paul says it on FOX news not some hog calling contest in Iowa
To No. 8 Marisacat’s recap of Wozzle—
First time poster her, long time lurker.
I post as a fellow senior who will turn 56 shortly, as a long time (yet, no longer) resident of an old time, parochial, cranky city perhaps similar to Pittsburgh (and Baltimore too, I think)–New Orleans–,and as a frustrated democrat.
I should have known from the old sixties days that the dems were beyond trust. Hey, remember back in the Vietnam era, it was the liberals who were the enemy? It was taken for granted that they were full of hooey.
Oh, well, in my dotage I came around and thought there would be some change with a demo congress.
Slap me, please.
Dkos is a great site to watch disenchantment and the dissolution of mispleaced idealism. Fun.
MitM: I just saw a very amusing flick on, of all things, “Lifetime” (the channel for wimmens). It’s called Mini’s First Time and is like The Last Seduction meets Lolita. Not nearly as good as The Last Seduction but it has some delightful moments such as Alec Baldwin and Jeff Goldblum slugging it out in a posh LA mansion. They are two of my least favorite actors, but they gained my respect by throwing themselves so heartily into this pile of dark-humored schlock.
Good trashy fun.
First part of John Dean’s new series on current conservatism:
Didn’t MSOC say she doesn’t do timeouts?
lol…every time MSOC takes off Diane takes over, like the authoritarian nutbar she is, and MSOC has to write a long, screeching post when she comes home. Can’t wait.
Don’t question the blogmom’s words. If you do, you’re a “stalker”.
Marie–I am sure the goods are not up to the quality I experienced as a child.
but it is part of my fond memories as a child-we were either eating porkribs in sauerkraut, or corned beef and cabbage.
we were dumb Poles.
multiple entries on Pavarotti at Opera Chic…
Much drip, much focus on the later Luciano P, the last 15 years…… but the entry that centers on Mirella Freni stands out.
Also Muti (OC translation, they link to the Italian transcript at La Repubblica)
my peice at PFF is updated witht he lastes NYT piece. They have some numbers. Money coming in and going out … $600K one month
I should have known from the old sixties days that the dems were beyond trust. Hey, remember back in the Vietnam era, it was the liberals who were the enemy? It was taken for granted that they were full of hooey
Steve (hello!,sorry you got stuck in Moderation as a first comment) at # 74
ain’t it the truth……..
That party thread at LameWing is hilarious. if it weren’t for the “TROLL” there would be very little discussion at all. They are the tiniest of crazy islands.
Canadian & American cooperation:
This may be good… its an 8 pager on Hillary from newsweek… just started it… She IS Tracy Flick yall
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20649206/site/newsweek/?from=rss
83, MitM: if you stay far enough away, every brown-skinned dark-haired person looks like Al-Qaeda.
Craptacular article….
puff pastry
well, damned good thing that the Governments and the fossil food companies that own them have successfully prevented anything being done about this:
HOw about you pray for people to listen to the damned scientists and DO SOMETHING about rapidly changing the way we do things?
I think one went into spam.
They were invited by Bartholomew I, the spiritual leader of 250 million Orthodox Christians worldwide.
Well, good for the Orthodox – the Pope can’t be bothered. He’s too busy with pederasty scandals.
Revisionist
Thanks for the Newsweek. the pic at the top is a hoot.
Yeah I so want a mean governess running things. How is that better.
Yes, the change is going to need to be this drastic:
There it is …
Pederasty
San Diego just agreed to 128 mil settlement on victims.
Think the pope doesn’t do group prayer… LOL. SPecially not going out in some dinghy with “the others”.
8)
A common thread in the many clinton articles i have read since I became an anti clinton activist is “so and so spoke” only in anynonimity because they are afraid of the clintons.
what kind of retribution can they bring down? mcaullife isnt at the DNC. they only power they obviously have is telling people not to donate but if i am a millionaire what do i care what the clintons say, i give to who ever.
this is a tpoic that needs flushing out. do they have files on everyone and its simple blackmail or do they have very long and powerful reach that isnt so obviuos.
Rev
I think the Clintons have power in the media. Yes i know it seems counterintuitive after the 90s. But they do hav a network… now they are bonafide fixers with a Foundation and what have you.
No longer semi upstarts (to the extent they ever were) from Swampland.
Here is the link to the newsweek Hillary piece,
all on one page version…
Mark Morford
Boy is this ever true (madman’s link to the Guardian. comment 91)
All hail Wal-Mart for imposing a 20% reduction in its own carbon emissions.
But the point is that supermarkets are over. We cannot have such long supply lines between us and our food. Not any more.
The very model of the supermarket is unsustainable, what with the packaging, food miles and destruction of British farming. Small, independent suppliers, processors and retailers or community-owned shops selling locally produced food provide a social glue and reduce carbon emissions.
********
Except for cities and older suburbs with smallish neighborhoods and close in, small scale shopping street or streets, the nation has lost the ability for this. [all hail the coverleaf and the over pass]
Would not, had they listened to jane Jacobs and others…
Rev,
Hsu Steered Major Fundraiser to Obama
Wasn’t sure if you’d seen that one.
#86 Rev: a Democratic donor who has given money to Clinton, Obama and Edwards, and would not even say which city he lived in on the record for fear of retribution from the Clintons.
I trolled through a celebrity who gave what to whom site a week ago and left it perplexed that so many of them seemed not to care who wins as long as it’s a DEM. Maxxed out on at least two if not more of the DEM candidates. As this information is so easy to get these days, not sure why the Hillary camp would employ enforcers (but maybe they don’t they are tech idiots).
The MSM always had a love-hate relationship with Bill & Hill. They only wanted to make sure that Bill-Hill properly courted them and weren’t interested in kicking them out of the DC club. It took those two a long time to get that. All Bill ever had to do was hold more press conferences but he chose to do the opposites which aggravated the situation and made him look even sneakier than he is. (Hill’s the privacy freak.)
Many of the small and organic supermarkets and co-ops raised money for area farmers who lost entire crops due to the recent flooding.
I can get some amazingly fresh food at the local Pick and Save, which buys a lot of WI product.
so tru mcat — I get sick of hearing the lefties spout that bullshit about local this and that. support local farmers.
any produce that can be grown locally is probably already at your supermarket.
most of us are probabaly 60 mles from real farm. then there is the issue of areas where farming isnt that good even if they wanted too. there is reason they grow cotton in some areas.
and what happens in the winter. do we all stock up for 4 months???
people also cant really make enough money to live on selling things locally. I guess some could but say you had a couple of fruit trees. how many jars of jam would you have to sell to survive. not to mention the time and effort it would take for little in return.
there is a reason women turned to all the modern back in the 50s and 60s. its a lot of work day in and day out. there is no one home all day to deal with that.
subsistance living is fine if you have your own land and time and energy to work it.
we cant go back to the 19th century.
a better solution would be to get rid of fast food chains . they waste so many resources.
well fwiw, Bradley is on the record that in the 90s the Clintons (both) threatened senators with “demonisation” if they went against them (in the Gerth VanAtta book).
All that does is drive Democrats fully to the cover of the Republicans. Just iwth more intensity.
And in the fine fashion of poltiics, ‘demonisation’ is also whisper campaigns. SOmething the Clintons/operatives do well.
Frankly let them all tear at each other. I wll ship buckets to DC to catch the blood.
we’re GONNA go back to the 19th century, it’s just a matter of time, and circumstances.
The Newsweek folks don’t get it: HRC is being installed as the Democratic Party nominee to take a fall. Same as Kerry in ’04. She’s not MEANT to win, she’s meant to lose–not by much, but “close” only counts in hand grenades–in order to “validate” a corrupt system (see, we had a fair and free election, and the Republican won!).
If HRC and BC somehow do manage to win, they were both long ago so hopelessly and thoroughly co-opted by “the System” that they will govern in a manner that will not cause any great discomfort to the ruling class. Either way, the owners of America, Inc., win and the rest of us lose. Voting on Election Day 2008 is just another way to say that you like queuing up to flip levers that aren’t attached to anything or punching holes to see if you can avoid the dreaded Dangling Chad.
Upthread, I see reference to a place called “MyLeftWing” and someone called “Maryscott O’Connor”. This must be a new blog, as I cannot recall ever having heard either one of them mentioned.
Did I mention that I purchased the amnesia ray from the “Men In Black” films from its props department? I paid…hm, how much DID I pay for it? Can’t remember…and yes, I do remember my name, as I had the foresight to have it embroidered onto the waistband of all my knickers.
Shadowthief,
From the last thread:
Who won? (I’m assuming DD)
one of the networks did a story on this. its very common for people who give to give to several in the primaries. they can spend the same on a hotel room for the night or dress. hedging their bets. getting to go to swell parties. most dont really kick in the big bucks until the general.
the gist of the segmant was that donations in no way actually equal support. its like buying girls scout cookies or candles from someone s kid at your work.
Can someone here help me out? Am I married to Salma Hayek? Or at least the father of her child?
Damn amnesia ray…it has a “Full Monty” setting that wipes out your whole life. I just wanted to forget everything from December 2000 on.
Colleen–they drew straws (Kos arranged them and assured the others that the contest wasn’t rigged)–and DelawareDem was selected to be “the woman”. Armando threw a fit (in my dream, not in real life–the real Armando is far too pacific for such histrionics) and demanded a change because HE wanted to be the woman. Kos responded by banning him from the island, and Armando waded into the ocean and began swimming for the next closest one.
Kos and DelawareDem then realised that they were running short of food and decided to turn cannibal. Their eyes turned to Elise and…I woke up, curiously hungry.
subsistence farming vs. industrialized farming is a false choice or dichomtomy. As a society, it was in our interest to assist small famers to maximize their productivity and biodiversity and subsidize their income when needed. We need good stewards of the earth. It probably would have cost less than what we’ve spent subsidizing the corporate mega-farms. A single grower and distributor food chain is crazy.
Same thing with energy. A little bit of this and a little bit of that is better than relying on a giant single energy producer.
Will we call them Victory Gardens next time?
Jeralyn at Talk Left wonders what all of the fuss is about over Hsu. Well, d’oh! If he’d been donating to the GOP, she and the rest of the so-called lefty blogosphere would be all over this like white on rice but because it involves the Democrats Who Can Do No Wrong it’s no big deal.
Shadow – if you get Salma than I get Antonio or Clooney (I’m not fussy, either will do — don’t even need a ring and license)
I don’t think Hill’s being set up to lose. Kerry most definitely was. No, Hill’s the one they can live with; although they might be taking a serious second look at Mitt. (The rest of the GOP candidates are loons.) As they say, the story is developing. Stay tuned.
aint that the truth catnip. they would be round robining it like they did larry craig.
did anyone explain to her that it had to do with her expertise — the law. he was funnling money that came from who knows where to clinton illegally through third parties.
i am not a lawyer but if you bother to just glance at the history of clinton and fundraising a pattern is plainly obvious.
We can do urban farming, you know. Take it from me (gasp, a BRIT presuming to give gardening advice!), you can get an incredible yield of certain crops from a small garden, where sunlight, soil quality, moisture, and exposure to pests are strictly controlled.
My Dad and Mum were getting too old to work their very large vegetable garden, but wanted to keep their yield. I sat down with my Dad and designed a more controlled garden that would be require one-fourth the labour and yet yield the same amount of crops.
It didn’t work. The new garden requires one-fourth less labour, but actually yields MORE crops than the old, digging-in-mother-earth garden. The garden is actually a tiered garden, which was inspired in my mind by the Hanging Gardens of Babylon and the Mayan pyramids (the garden looks like a Mayan pyramid, in fact–well, a series of five pyramids, each one of which grows several crops that require different soil depths).
A lot of people don’t realise you can grow potatoes in a sack, or in a trash can, requiring no more than one cubic metre of space to produce 10-20 kilogrammes of potatoes.
I envision urban gardens which would not only beautify our cities, but create jobs and give city people a chance to cleanse themselves by plunging their hands into some good black dirt and making things grow. It’s good for the soul. Those who work the garden get a share of the produce they nurture to maturity. There’s absolutely no reason you can’t have such a garden in the centre of Watts or even San Francisco, as the pyramid gardens are parismonious with space. The pyramid can be created with simple wood, or with native stone, both of which will age with time and acquire a beauty and majesty of their own.
While we’re at it, let’s plant some flower gardens, as well. I love flowers because most are good for absolutely nothing except being beautiful (just like me).
These gardens are no substitute for modern farming, but every kilogram of food grown in such a garden is one that does not have be shipped in from afar. These are supplemental sources of food (and could be quite handy in an urban disaster) and also help people build a sense of community. The idea of a community garden isn’t new; I’m merely proposing that the design be made far more space- and labour-efficient, and the scale vastly increased.
Sorry I’ve got all soppy and idealistic. You got me on gardening, and I actually have hope when I’m helping something to grow. Next, let’s argue about the proper way to prepare tea and at the end, we’ll all agree that my way is best.
Jeralyn probably got Hsu to buy her a new laptop, hence the defence of the rascal.
Upthread, I see reference to a place called “MyLeftWing” and someone called “Maryscott O’Connor”. This must be a new blog, as I cannot recall ever having heard either one of them mentioned.
I’m beginning to think My Left Drama is actually a project of a D-list Hollywood producer who thought he’d roll out a sitcom idea about a completely dysfunctional political family online to see what the ratings might be like.
unfortuntely lots of reasons to leverage in a nominal dem.
cleaner better wars, evoke kennedy.. sell a draft, early years as some high minded but ver fucked national service…
and etc. she has partnered with the right… clearly.
Jeralyn probably got Hsu to buy her a new laptop, hence the defence of the rascal.
No kidding. It’s bad enough that she’s trying to blow off the story but to actually defend the guy? What is she smoking?
The Newsweek folks don’t get it: HRC is being installed as the Democratic Party nominee to take a fall.
I dunno. I can think of two reasons the “ruling class” might want her as president.
1.) They already know what they’ve got on the Clintons and what they can blackmail them with.
2.) Do they really want another obviously hard rightist in the White House. Remember, most of us think Hillary’s a right wing ruling class stooge. Lots of regular Americans think she’s a liberal.
So with Hillary they’ve got someone they own who everybody thinks is a progressive. With Thompson, Giuliani or Romney, they’ve got another out of the closet Nazi they haven’t necessarily bought yet.
Of course, there’s no guarantee Hillary’s going to win the general election. There’s plenty of populist anger on the right about immigration that could bring her down in November of 2008.
Then the ruling class says “cool”. We own Giuliani too. And we used Hillary to get rid of that pesky Democratic primary process and take peoples minds off impeachment.
i call her out in update 12 catnip
lmao.. that how i ended my screed… everyone is thinking the same thing
I agree, HRC would be a more useful tool than Romney, just as her husband was.
“But…but…but…this can’t be fascism! She’s a DEMOCRAT!”
Serena Joy and Commander Romney both have authoritarian personalities and would govern almost identically in both policy and style: it’s Mother Knows Best v. Father Knows Best.
However, HRC may also be set up as the nominee so that Romney, who is so lightweight he must have lead socks to keep him from floating away, can appear to be a giant-killer. Because everybody I know who is planning on voting for Hillary thinks that Bill is her puppetmaster, and that they are voting for a third term of Bill Clinton. If the Commander beats Serena Joy, then he has beaten Bill himself.
Hair Club, when you put “ruling class” in ” ” marks, it makes me think that you think that the term is dubious.
Do you think there’s no “ruling class” in the United States? A clearly identifiable socio-economic group that has a grossly disproportionate share of American society’s wealth and political power? Or am I reading too much into the quotation marks?
I await your “answer”
OK!
Miss Devore
and Revisionist
(parts 10 – 12 should be new if you have not read it this weekend)
are Front Paged at PFF.
8)
Just got an email from Jeralyn. Here’s the gist of it:
Dear Shadowthief: This is the first I’ve heard of this “ruling class”. Is it true they have lots of money? Do you think any of them would buy me some new computer gadgets? I’m so desperate for a new color printer that I’m actually considering spending my own salary for one!
I await your reply,
Jeralyn
Should I reply?
Well, when I got frontpaged at PFF, I was accused of being an apple polisher! I made it quite clear at the time that I traded sexual favours to get that frontpage diary. Peeder’s a lonely, lonely man.
HRC may also be set up as the nominee so that Romney, who is so lightweight he must have lead socks to keep him from floating away, can appear to be a giant-killer.
I don’t think they have to micromanage it that closely.
RIght now there is no, zero, nada bit of rebellion from the left. OK, there are some Trotskyists who will put on a few permitted anti-war marches (which the Vichy libs will earn their checks and demonize) and there’s the occasional Cindy Sheehan or Dennis Kucinich.
The left, it’s dead.
Then there’s those pesky left liberals. OK. Most of us know they’re nothing to worry about but the elite thinks they’re a pain in the ass. What better way to shut them up than to start the 2008 election early. It cuts off the anti-war movement. It cuts off impeachment. It starts liberals foaming at the mouth about the Supreme Court.
In other words, this year you won’t even have to worry about a patheticall weak challenge from someone like Dean.
So what do you have now. You have Hillary, bought and paid for by the ruling class and you have one of several interchangeable white males in the Republican party.
What’s the wild card?
Anger from the right about Mexicans.
That’s what the election’s going to be about, determining how strong this rightist populism is. If it’s strong, they call up Tucker Carlson, Chris Matthews, Hannity, Fox, the media in general and say “that stuff we have on Hillary. Um. Let’s start talkinga about it”.
Then the Republican wins and he’s in sync with the new out of the closet Nazi mood of the country.
IF the righest populism is weaker, if the American people are starting to lose that kill the brown people Nuremberg rally edge and you have to passify them with an apparent moderate for a few years, well then, you want the Clintons.
Call the media and tell them to start running Rudy Giuliani fuckedup on 9/11 and let Bernie Kerik Fuck Judith Regan over ground zero, Mitt Romney has 8 wives, or Fred Thompson sucked on Law and Order stories, and you get the Clintons.
Any way you cut it, it’s over. Fascism’s here. I’m going to live most of my adult life with it. I’m a Spaniard in 1940 in Spain. That’s just something I’ll have to deal with. The political arena is closed, slammed shut, under control.
Do you think there’s no “ruling class” in the United States?
1.) Yes. There’s a ruling class.
2.) No. I’m not in it.
I made it quite clear at the time that I traded sexual favours to get that frontpage diary. Peeder’s a lonely, lonely man.
You Craiged him and he didn’t TuckerCarlson you?
I find that a rendezvous in a bathroom stall is sordid and beneath my dignity, Catnip.
We did it the classy way (back seat of a Camaro, parked in an alley).
By the by, don’t any of you believe Peeder when he tells you he’ll call you next day. He’s a one-off Johnny.
Here’s a shocker:
Isn’t this the political version of “we’re keeping the marriage together for the children?”
I’m sorry, I was rolling on the floor, laughing: they will not consult Mr. Bush or their immediate bosses before their appearances Monday and Tuesday, in order to preserve the “independence and the integrity of their testimony,” said one official.
“Integrity” is the FIRST word that leaps to mind when thinking about the Bush-Cheney administration.
Alex Jones was arrested today protesting Geraldo.
boober is selling the line that the bin Laden video is a fake because Larry Johnson says so and because David Brooks is making fun of the left. (boober is obsessed with what David Brooks says.)
Forget about the fact reported by WaPo that “it was likely that bin Laden had dyed his beard, as is customary for older men in some Muslim cultures.” No. If Larry Johnson ponders how OBL might get his hands on Grecian formula, boober has to believe him instead.
That’s right: bin Laden is a “myth”.
That last sentence was mine. WaPo link.
(Thou shalt not type with cold hands.)
Michelle Malkin and LGF are circulating the 9/11 Truthers disrupting Geraldo but honestly Fox News looks more ridiculous then they do in this clip.
LINK
How dare those 9/11 Truthers disrupt us when we’re interviewing bimbos in matching bimbo outfits.
oh goddess yes!
and i love home-made fridge sauerkraut and cucumber half dones too!
YUM!
now im hungry again, damnitawl.
for marie and shadowthief, if you have time. here’s the urban community garden movement (and it is a movement) here in houston.
urban community gardening is a huge savings for inner-city poor/working class in terms of reducing money spent on foodstuffs. this has to be happening all over.
urban harvest
i said i was hungry!
Steve at 74 makes good point about liberals in 60s. Liberals were, and are, stupid and indecisive, easily fooled (because they are willing fools) and never to be trusted.
However, to my many detractors out there who now consider me a right winger, let me just say that there were alternatives to liberalism on the left back in the 60s.
That there are not today doesnt mean a non lib equals a neocon. Bad times will shirely come again someday, and know, the Iraq war, a volunteer effort with insignificant bllodshed (by historical standards) hardly qualifies for bad times…..yet.
Know, radicalism requires recession, hyperinflation, depression, to take root.
It will happen again. Brown faces will lead the charge, not 60s dreamin white old codgers.
Did any of the MSBs cover the New Jersey democrat dragnet this week? I havent been following them but I have started to see a pattern that they just ignore anything negative.
Like if you just read the front pages of several of them you would never know that Sheehan was arrested in conyers office and was going to run against Pelosi.
Never ran across this psych theory before:
His actions had their roots in childhood, where Bill had lived through “terrible conflict” between his mother and grandmother. “A psychologist once told me that for a boy being in the middle of two women is the worst possible situation,” Clinton was quoted as saying. “There is always the desire to please each one.”
Or it being used to explain/excuse marital infidelity. Nice, another thing that men and their women enablers can blame on women. So, is Hillary grandma or mommy?
If she gets elected POTUS will Bill finally love her? How much of this is about her need to please Bill? For such a “smart, savvy woman,” she sure seems a lot like a battered wife. Not exactly what this country needs for its president.
Marie
I burst out laughing at that bullshite, esp the “sins of weakness”.
What a fucking LUNATIC.
Years ago when I read that she extracted a “promise” from BillBoy when they made the 92 run that all that was over, I laughed just as hard.
FUCKING LUNATIC.
I agree, the little woman on a mission – of some kind.
FUCKING LUNATIC.
BTW, the Bernstein book is very interesting her the real deal in the Rodham home. NOt the simple picture she likes to paint.
Oops. Trouble in Street Prophets paradise. Someone light some candles and start the rosary.
LOL Let me say it again Fucking Lunatic.
Going from the crazy butch for war bushboy to lunatic middle mittel middle of nowhere wif of bill
how did we get so lucky?
oh very funny catnip.
Does he plan to miss Brothers and Sisters tomorrow? The wicked old world needs its Pastor Damned… and his collection plat.
Rev,
Have you seen this diary about Hsu?
Even kos called Hsu “Just some random bundler”. Hmmm…they sure don’t want to look at this story.
Poorly written, poorly sourced, poorly argued
well you know why they are freaking. All that Chinese, Mainland China money floating around in 95/96
Again iirc Bradley went on the record late in the 90s about that money.
I am sure Rev if you google you can find … I forget the name in the nineties that fronted the mooney. hmm started iwth a w, Wong Wang… ugh. Somthing close.
Poorly written, poorly sourced, poorly argued
Well, it doesn’t match up to what you’ve put together but I thought it raised some interesting questions.
Does he plan to miss Brothers and Sisters tomorrow?
Who knows? Maybe he converted to Islam!
shadowthief’s onto something with the urban gardening bit (if not the silly custom of putting milk in perfectly good tea, no doubt). one of the ways cuba deal;t with the end of cheap oil in the 90s was intensive use of every conceivable space in havana to grow food, to the point where they grow something like 50% of the food in-city.
since most american cities are unreasonably spread-out, this actually gives us one small opportunity to avoid starvation: tear up the lawns, and plant fruit trees and gardens. this is why i don’t buy kunstler’s scenario of burnt-out suburbs (well, not entirely). if the shit hits the fan, after a reasonable amount of panicking, we can always go back to raising chickens and growing tomatoes in the side yards, since we’ll have nothing to do once the economy implodes.
i love the idea of urban garden ziggurats.
then again, perhaps i’m overly optimistic because i live in the middle of warm-winter ag land. an advantage to living out in the sticks, relatively speaking.
oh, and i agree with mary that IOZ nailed tghat one on “islamofascism.” every time i read one of those guys banging on about that crap, it makes me think of the unnamed protagonist in oe kenzaburo’s 17, about a loner kid in 1960s japan who finds his calling busting communist heads for the fascist right. the wingnut kid’s self-hating obsession with masturbation, and the homoeroticism of violence was creeplily similar to so many of these wingnut guys’ approach toward their own (and god forbid women’s) bodies and sexuality.
d’oh, maria, not mary.
new thread
LINK
Revisionist
Johnnie Chung.. that was the name in 96, that fronted the money…
Revisionist
Just going thru the Holland diary at PFF and saw a couple of your comments…
1. IIRC kos father was a Greek immigrant to Salvador. Met the mother there. No idea where they married.
2. The father is dead. That SS# that “port” found is, I am pretty certain, the father.
too much fun after a long fall nap! MSOC & Lucious Vagina allied. The right doesn’t own faith, but pastor damn doesn’t own the domain. Aravia liberated by buhdydharma. So Hsu me.