#1
Tough hitting short article. As the old saying goes, "Hope is not a method." To be successful, the republicans must develop a plan of recovery from all of this Obama spending and debt. It is encouraging however, to see the dems already conceding potential defeat in 2010.
#2
Deciding to drive in the knife is Strategy. Sticking it in here and NOW is tactics.
Ten inch blade, right under the sternum and lean on it hard, again, AGAIN. get a towel and a large industrial sized trashbag. Put him in the trunk in the garage. Then a fifty gallon drum and a trip to Home Depot for the 90 pound bag of cement mix. Roll, dont lift, the drum onto the pickup flatbed. Drive to the lake at 3 in the morning. Pick a spot where the bank is suitable for rolling the drum and make sure the water is deep at that point. Getting rid of the body is harder than the killing usually. Think it through.
Hope is not a method, you cant "improvise" some things. And some people truly deserve it.
Savor and remain silent. No warning, no threats.
He's right about having a plan to undo what Obama has done. Just cut the whole thing out with an electric chainsaw in the tub, slice it up in the garage ...and feed it to the dog.
...and get rid of the chainsaw.
Metaphorically speaking, of course. Unless you think we should have civil and tolerant thoughts for our Democratic Party associates...reasoned debate with Harry Reid and House Speaker Pelosi..and then coffee afterwards?
Metaphorically speaking , of course.
Smile, keep smiling. All ten inches of Solingen steel.
#3
The Republican's most successful 1980s thru 2000s strategy is to get a lot of people to invest in the stock market via their IRAs, 401ks, etc.
The new investors have slowly begun to see what hurts them and what helps them.
The Republican's other successful strategy (1990s) was to pass the welfare reform bill. The success of welfare reform has undermined a generation of Dem Welfarists.
The Dems most successful strategy has been to take control of the culture (the 'news' networks, Hollywood, etc.).
Posted by: lord garth ||
12/23/2009 11:14 Comments ||
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#4
The Third Parties are thinking Financial Logistics.
In the aftermath of the economic collapse and the election of a glamorous new, young president who seemed to many people as a fresh force, unentangled with entrenched special interests (emphatically not my view, during the election or afterward) - the country could have gone one of two ways: Fearing the rigors of economic hard times, people could have sought shelter under the wing of a stronger government (as Americans did during the Great Depression), or, fearing the power of government, they could seek shelter in freedom - come what may economically.
It may turn out to be one of the most important facts of the 21st century that the American people - as exemplified by, but not limited to, the tea-party fighters - came down on the side of freedom over fear. I don't know if there is another people on the planet who would have had a similar impulse and judgment. It is, to use a word, exceptional (as in "American exceptionalism").
It is why we live in hope this Christmas season that we may yet claw back our government in time to protect our grandchildren's freedom and prosperity.
"Yet, Freedom! yet thy banner, torn, but flying, streams like the thunderstorm against the wind." - Lord Byron.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/23/2009 00:00 ||
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The struggles of the Democrats and the Republicans are making news. The Democrats are learning that it is far easier to make campaign promises than it is to govern. As for Republicans, the party that loses the Presidential election often spends the off-year attempting to refine its message if not find a new message and new messengers. In the watchful eye of 24/7 cable news channels and the Internet, however, such political soul searching can appear rather untidy. As the calendar turns, the process remains unresolved for Republicans to say the least. To say the least. There hasn't been a lot of inspiring leadership coming out of the trunk camp, and none of it from Congressional Publicans.
Worse than mere overexposure, according to Rasmussen polling, despite Obama's falling polls and Democrat divisions, the Republican Party would fare worse in an upcoming election than the Tea Party -- a "Third Party" that, as of yet, does not exist. If it's going to be effective next year it had better influence primaries, rather than trying to field candidates.
It is no minor issue because with the help of Tea Party activists, Republicans certainly can beat Democrats next year -- without them they may not. I think the Publicans could improve their position with Tea Party neutrality, but I think most people who're paying attention would rather see the lot of them turned out, Publicans and Sinners -- a complete inversion of the current Congress. That won't happen because of the number of nailed seats -- we're never going to see the last of Barney Frank or Nancy Pelosi until they die. There are also lots of seats that are close enough that a few judicious truckloads of "found" ballots will tip them. So I wouldn't get too fired up about Congress turning around.
It would seem evident to many that the Tea Party movement should be the natural ally of the Republican Party. Not after the Publicans' record after the first few months of the Contract with America...
After all, the issues that inspire most Tea Party activists should not be inimical to Republican Party leaders. However, the fact that the Tea Party movement is at odds with certain aspects of the Republican establishment belies the greater issue as to why the Tea Party movement -- and its potential to be a 3rd Party movement -- arose at all. That reason being that people have come to the perhaps belated realization that their elected pols could give a spit what their opinions are, whether those pols are Publicans or Sinners.
It is worthy, as part of this discussion, to note that the rise and fall of third party movements and candidates is directly tied to whether voters perceive the existing parties as being successful. In this context, successful means providing effective leadership on the major issues of the day. Third parties are difficult to get off the ground. Both the Dems and the Pubs trace their roots to the original Democratic-Republicans of Jefferson. Effectively we've had one party with "liberal" and "conservative" wings, only the definitions changing. Federalists and Whigs have fallen by the wayside. Most everybody else either never got started or, like the Conservative Party in New York, rides the same rail as the big party.
The Republicans should well know this lesson. After all, the Republican Party came into being because the Whig Party of the 1850's and 1860's was perceived as not willing to provide effective leadership on the most divisive issue of the day -- if not the most divisive issue ever: slavery. Appearing too accomodationist to many voters, a third major party came into being under the leadership of Lincoln and others: the Republican Party -- a party that, in time, took a decisive stand against slavery. The remnants of the Whigs combined with a wing of the Dems, hence the "Republican" name. The Dems were the party of slavery at the time, just as they're the party of the plantation today.
More recently, Ross Perot ran twice for President and gave life to the Reform Party. It is more than arguable that Perot handed Bill Clinton the Presidency by drawing so many votes away from President Bush in 1992. But did he? Yes. No doubt in my miniature mind that he did.
As a matter of history, Perot was more of a symptom of failed leadership by Republicans than cause of Clinton's victory. The errors of the Bush Administration gave rise to a perception that the Republican Party was the party of higher spending and higher tax rates -- a policy that led to burgeoning deficits. Bush 41 was not perceived as a leader in the wake of breaking his "no new tax pledge" and the Democrats were not exactly considered leaders on how to handle the deficit either. It is on such political battlefields that disgruntled voters take interest in a third voice -- in that case, Ross Perot and his Reform Party. Perot had good financing -- his own bankroll, plus donations -- and he had lotsa good points to make. That sucking sound you heard really was your job heading south. But he also ran what was primarily a vanity campaign, and as soon as Pat Buchanan -- now trying manfully to hop the Tea Party bandwagon -- hijacked the party it evaporated. Buchanan had the ego, but not the message, nor the bankroll. Go, Pat, Go, and Don't Come Back...
Of course, the John Anderson presidential run should be noted as well. What's that line about "sound and fury, signifying nothing"? Pretty scary, until he evaporated on election day.
There was little doubt that in 1979 and in the beginning of 1980, the public's view of both the Democrat Party and the Republican Party had dimmed considerably. Amidst double-digit inflation and unemployment, 20+% interest rates, and little in the way of Republican Congressional leadership to contrast Jimmy Carter failings, John Anderson ran as an Independent candidate for President. He came out of the gate with 25% in the polls -- 6% higher than Perot's highest ever finish. He was barely there when it was all over...
Yet Anderson wound up not winning a single precinct. Why? Because Ronald Reagan ran a stirring campaign behind the theme that "Government is not the solution to our problems. Government is the problem." Nobody's singing that song at the moment who doesn't sound like he's reciting something by rote that he doesn't believe. John McCain as a "foot soldier in the Reagan Revolution" my foot...
And with that, Reagan and his strong leadership and policies won two terms (three if you count Bush 41s' first term) and there was no third party challenge until Bush Sr. ceded Reagan's high ground of leadership as referenced above. "Read my lips: No new taxes!... Well, okay. Where do I sign?" I can remember all the editorials in the Washington Post saying how it would take political courage for Bush to sign the tax bill. Once the Dems had siggy there was nary a peep from the Post about how brave he'd been.
All of which brings us to the Tea Party movement. Shall we attemtp to make sense of what's surely a complicated matter?
The numbers of Independents voters is on the rise again. Voters everywhere believe the Democrat Party and the Republican Party are more partisan than effective. The Tea Party movement is an out-growth of that perception. Existing Third Parties don't fill the bill. The Libertarian Party evaporated under Harry Browne -- he was against going to war in Afghanistan in the wake of 9-11 so he was never heard from again. The Reform Party elected Jesse Ventura and didn't elect either Ross Perot or Pat Buchanan, and has since evaporated. There's something called the Constitution Party, which wants to restore the Constitution as well as the nation's biblical foundations, which kinda leaves room for argument with us agnostics and the Jews and the New Agers and what have you. The Greens are red on the inside, with a sniff like Nader wearing the same socks he had in the Army in 1958 or whenever it was, compounded with the smell of burning weed. If there was anything there to run with somebody would have run with it by now.
At its core, the Tea Party movement is a pro-liberty -- limited government movement. Its activists continue to believe in Reagan's cogent message about government. Beneath that over-arching theme, Tea Partiers by-in-large are motivated by four major issues. (1) excessive taxation, (2) out-of-control spending, (3) out of control Legislators who pass bills without reading them, and (4) the apparent lack of adherence/respect for our Constitution. None of those issues should be troublesome for the Republican establishment -- yet there is anything but an easy alliance between the Tea Party movement and the Republican establishment. It is a wonder why that is so. It's no wonder. The Publicans had their time in the driver's seat. They were the reason Bill Clinton finished up his second term pointing with pride at the surplus he'd fought and the end of welfare as he knew it. Even by then they were listening to the Washington Post and all those other fellows telling them to "govern from the center," unwilling to realize that the Dems are better at being Dems than they are. Add in some fairly deep-rooted corruption -- Dennis Hastert springs to mind -- and people were simply disappointed in them. Excessive Taxation. The issue of burdensome taxation has motivated Americans from the time of the Boston Tea Party to today. Always a potent issue, many activists wonder why the Republican Establishment has lost their voice on this important issue. Keep in mind that the issue is not just that people don't want to pay taxes because they are stingy. The issue is why aren't Republican leaders making the case to the American people (1) that high tax rates defeat their own purpose (Keynes), (2) that "that our present tax system ... exerts too heavy a drag on growth ... siphons out of the private economy too large a share of personal and business purchasing power, [and] reduces the financial incentives for personal effort, investment, and risk-taking." (Kennedy), or (3) that through tax relief we can grow the American economy (Reagan). Surely taking up that mantle -- with clarity -- is not a request that is too much for Tea Partiers to ask of Republican leaders. It's not just the taxes. No matter how much we pay in taxes, and it's a bunch, there are always more taxes needed, because there's never any end to the bright ideas pols are coming up with. There are always new programs, and old programs never, ever go away. There is no end to the rapacity of those who regard themselves as a ruling class -- and increasingly as an hereditary ruling class. Out-of-Control Spending. The issue of government waste and spending is of major concern to many activists around the country. Keep in mind that in 1964, the entire federal budget was roughly $130 billion and poverty was approximately 14%. The federal budget is nearly $4 trillion a year now. We currently make social welfare transfers of over $1 trillion per year. Yet the federal poverty rate remains around 14%. Disgruntled Tea Partiers (and Ron Paul supporters) know that intuitively even if they do not always know the statistics. Should not Republican leaders be exposing the stunning level of federal waste (including $1 in every $10 of Medicare spending) at every turn -- even filibustering ever growing budgets which provide little return on investment? Is that request too much to ask? -- let alone insisting they refrain from pork barreling themselves? So not only do the taxes keep trying to go back up, and to appear in new and more inventive guises, but the spending keeps outstripping even the gruesome level of taxes we have. The debt keeps going up every year, we've been effectively in a deficit since... can anyone remember when we weren't? Other than the couple years under the Republican Congress in the last couple Clinton years? And when we did run a surplus, the Dems wanted to spend it. We're looking at a Congress, both Republicans and Democrats, who keep spending without looking at the checkbook, which has been empty. At the same time they're implementing programs that kill our competitiveness and handing out money like it grows in the garden. Which is approximately true, if you regard the taxpayer as a species of vegetable, or a fungus, something like a mushroom. Reading the Bills. Federal legislation now exceeds 1,000 pages at a time. It is well beyond common knowledge that most politicians do not even read the bills upon which they vote. Given that so many congressmen and women are lawyers who would never expect their clients not to read the contracts they sign, is it really an exorbitant request of those same politicians to read bills before they bind us to legislation from which, incredibly, they often exempt themselves? Their staffs write the bills with the assistance of lobbyists, some of whom are subject matter experts, most of whom are owned by Malefactors of Great Wealth. The Constitution. There can be little doubt that our Constitution is not interpreted as our Founders intended. Jefferson and Madison opined that the Constitution did not permit the Congress to tax people to build roads. Now, without so much as an amendment, we tax people to subsidize the purchase of cars that run on those roads built with tax dollars. In that light, many activists well understand Justice Scalia's commentary that "The Constitution is not a living organism, it is a legal document. It says something and doesn't say other things." The question is whether Republican leaders believe the same or are willing to defend the same. They patently don't. The "living document" approach has gutted the 10th amendment especially, while fattening up the commerce clause so that it's eating everything in sight. But the very heart of the problem lies more with congress critters who have no idea what the document actually says.
The reality of today is that the Tea Party movement is more than skeptical of whether the Republican establishment is willing to take a stand on those issues or whether they are more interested in playing Let's Make a Deal with American principles. In other words, they do not believe that they are providing effective leadership on those important issues. Instead, they do things such as offering a Presidential candidate who wanted to buy up all the bad mortgages that government encouraged in the first place. A government response to a government problem -- Reagan would not be pleased -- and neither are Tea Partiers. If Republicans were providing effective leadership on those important issues, I would hazard a guess that there would not be a Tea Party movement today. McCain was sadly representative of how the public sees the party: not quite clean -- the Dems didn't bring up the Keating 5 very much because it was relatively small potatoes -- and willing to get along with the opposition. Compromise might be the essence of politix and maverick politicians, but there are times when you have to stand up for what's right. Congress is really good at nibbling at the edges of what's right until there's not much left to it at all.
In the final analysis, Republicans never do so well as to defend freedom and the expense of government -- when they run against City Hall instead of defending it. Not coincidentally, Americans never do so well as when freedom is protected from government. Reagan understood that and that is why he ran against the Washington establishment instead of encouraging it. Unless Republicans regain that understanding, rather than winning next year with Tea Party support amidst the troubles of the Democrats, Republicans may well be alone wearing the Whigs of long ago.
Posted by: Fred ||
12/23/2009 00:00 ||
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#1
No third party ever won.
Grab the conservatives, and storm the republican headquarters. Tell them I am not impressed and then get some good people back up there.
#6
A very clear article by Mr. Del Beccaro, and excellent commentary Fred.
Fred said " There is no end to the rapacity of those who regard themselves as a ruling class -- and increasingly as an hereditary ruling class."
Bingo. This has ALWAYS been the problem in Republics, as illustrated by Livy and expounded on by Machiavelli. The ruling class (in Rome it was the nobles) oppress the people. That's what they do. Some of the people love this, for any number of reasons. The problem today would seem to boil down to how to punish the governing-class- who have become arrogant and tyrannical, WITHOUT appointing a dictator(s), who usually become tyrants in fact.
#7
Can't speak for other Tea Parties, but the San Antonio Tea Party is basically beating the bushes for aspiring new candidates to run in both parties, and for all levels of office. We're looking to hold candidate forums, and meetings - it's been my sense that most of the other SATP supporters agree (well, as much as we can agree on anything!)that a third party is a non-starter. Better to push for new blood, for strict constitutionalists and fiscal conservatives coming up within the established party/parties.
The anger against the entrenched politicians, who vote for their own continuance in office, rather than the good of the nation at large is gathering, rather like a tsunami out at sea. I am thinking that it will crash into Washington with the 2010 election season, and a lot of pundits and political aristocrats will be left shattered, because they had no idea of the depth of that anger...
#8
The Tea Party must reformulate its message, that government over-reaching, extravagance, and over-taxation are ultimately the same issue, and that there ain't no such thing as a free lunch.
#9
The Tea Party is not a Party. It is not a single organization of any kind. Each local entity is independent. At least in ours, actions are only 'suggestions' of time, place and theme where members and non-members might choose to gather - no leaders to be arrested. And since members are largely gainfully employed, arrest or black-listing are of real concern. I don't know that the Republicrat/Demican Party would take kindly to serious threats to its turf.
#11
newsc, the third party has won in the past. About 150 years ago, the Republican party WAS the third party. Just ask the Whigs. I have given up on the republicans and I'm just waiting for the chance to jump at a viable alternative. It takes a crisis (like the desire to banish the evils of slavery) for a third party to rise. Unfortunately, things will have to get much worse before enough Americans wake up enough to bring the next party to power. With today's complete lack of competent leadership, however, it's only a matter of time.
#13
In many ways the task of re-making government today is as daunting a task as was that of creating a government some 200 plus years ago. Voter dissatisfaction may be great enough to bring about the change that is really needed.
#14
the time to fight is in the primary. Third party candidates give the election to the Donks. Fight fiercely and support the winner in the main election contest, otherwise you've helped elect our socialist Donks.
Posted by: Frank G ||
12/23/2009 19:59 Comments ||
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The top U.S. commander in Iraq, Major General Anthony Cucolo passed a new policy which may mean time in the brig for soldiers, airmen, and Marines who become pregnant while on active duty in a combat zone. This issue presents so many moral, tactical, and ethical problems I cant possibly cover them all.
There is the issue of personal freedom, the issue of husband and wife deployed together, the issue of rape, the issue of accidental pregnancy
Where do we draw the line? Lets talk about the nature of military service...
#2
we sent a couple females home from our last deployment for this. In the cases where the father was i.d.'d both were taken to NJP. We obviously kept the men in country. So, we sent home about 3-4 Marines and other Marines had to pick up their work or we sent a few Marines from CONUS to pick it up.
This will always be an issue until we get serious and less PC about so called rights in the military. I don't know of any commander who has or would court martial anyone over a pregnancy. Politically a hot tamale. That being said, I don't disagree w/offering the 5 yr birth control plan to females after bootcamp. Yes, I know condoms are better because of their ability to stop some STDs.
#4
I went a couple of rounds with this yesterday on Open Salon, trying to put across a couple of points - such as, yes, this is somewhat of a problem. There are women who deliberately become pregnant to get out of a TDY, etc - and the fact that they have done so is greatly resented.
Of course, some of the nimrods at OS were hyperventilating about birth control, morning after pills, etc not being available (one particular numbskull insisted that this was a policy of the Bush Administration) and that military women were in constant danger of being raped by male servicemen. To hear them tell hyperventilate, one would think they actually gave a damn about military women, and weren't just seizing on another bloody shirt to wave at the DOD.
Sigh ... I hate it when people who don't know the first thing about the military, or even any for-real military people, get up on a soap-box...
#5
Getting pregnant is optional, even IF raped. This is simply one of two things:
1.) People lacking good sense & self-control, as their actions have the possibility of harming their mission & unit. These (both parties) should therefore be courts-martialed for dereliction of duty as the military doesn't pay troops to be screwing each other
2.) People who don't want to do their job & intentionally become pregnant & who should be courts-martialed for dereliction of duty
In either case, it is a failure of the inDUHvidual to do the right thing in the position and duty they swore an oath to uphold and/or perform.
Let's not let anything we say in this thread be construed as to be indifferent to or tolerant of rape. 'K?
#7
Agree with Besoeker- not this again. Soldiers will screw. Give the females intrauterine contraception or the shot and save taxpayers 250k in wasted money for soldiers training. Court Martials cost lots too so an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Done.
#9
dzzrtrock, you obviously have never heard of certain religious traditions (including mine) that object to a woman getting an abortion even if she was raped.
Thankfully we do not live in a barbaric society that REQUIRES abortion (a la the Chinese), and I hope that our armed forces would never ever demand such a thing, regardless of the circumstances.
#10
P2K, thanks for the .pdf from the last thread. It did explicitly cover how pregnancy was handled for pregnant Woman Marines;
It is believed that pregnancy and motherhood ipso facto interfere with military duties...Granting of maternity leave would result in having ineffectives; replacements could not be procured while the woman remained on the active list; and the mother of a small child would not be readily available for reassignment. Necessary rotation of duty assignments would require the family unit to be broken up for considerable periods of time, or at least until the husband made the necessary provisions to establish the home at the mother's new duty station...It is believed that a woman who is pregnant or a mother should not be a member of the armed forces and should devote herself to the responsibilities which she had assumed, remaining with her husband and child as a family unit.
This sort of reasoning, typical of the times, formed the basis for Marine Corps regulations on the subject until 1970. The rules were very strictly enforced and any responsibility for children forced the separation of a woman Marine from the service.
As a male chauvanist pig, I can relate much better to that sort of reasoning. If only we had as much respect for children today.
#12
Right Chunky, the question is how to square that vision with real life here on this planet where humans are the top of the food chain, dont always do what they are told, even soldiers, and upwards of 75% have working plumbing. Short Answer: depo provera.
By Michael Crowley
The US Embassy in Islamabad is a tense and embattled place. The embassy complex is fortress-like, sequestered in a secure area to the east of the city known as the "diplomatic enclave," whose approaches are guarded by multiple security checkpoints. The compound's outer perimeter is festooned with barbed wire and towering walls. Arriving vehicles are stopped for bomb-checks, sealed into a quarantined area with high walls on either side and heavy iron doors at front and back. Embassy visitors are required to wear visible badges at all times--and they are checked frequently.
This is understandable in a city where anti-Americanism is on the rise, despite Congress's recent pledge of $7.5 billion in U.S. aid to Pakistan. (Indeed, that aid package, bizarrely enough, is part of the problem.) I heard one American (who does not work at the embassy) say that if he ever had a car accident in Islamabad, he would flee the scene if possible; the risks of being an American at in a place where a racuous crowd would inevitably gather are just too great. And when the entourage of staff and reporters traveling with Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Mike Mullen arrived at a Pakistani Air Force base on Wednesday evening, we were subjected to a nearly hourlong delay, as every one of our bags was passed through an x-ray bomb detector for reasons that seemed more about harassment than security. (Who ever heard of screening the bags of people getting off the plane?)
At the heart of this problem is the anti-Americanism and conspiracy-mongering of Pakistan's media, which I saw first-hand when I read through a large stack of local papers at the embassy. So I was glad to find on my return to Washington this week that the latest print issue of TNR features a really top-notch article by Nicholas Schmindle about Shireen Mazari, a Pakistani journalist who's been dubbed "the Anne Coulter of Pakistan," and who has been responsible for countless stories like the one that recently speculated about whether a Wall Street Journal reporter in the country is actually a CIA spy, potentially endangering his life. When I was Islamabad, one newspaper (I believe it was Mazari's The Nation, which is generally the worst offender) ran a story which included the wacko claim, attributed to Seymour Hersh, that a "death squad" backed by Dick Cheney was behind the 2007 assassination of Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto as well as the 2005 murder of Lebanese prime minister Raffik Hariri. (It seems this nutty rumor has been floating around since at least May, even though Hersh himself has publicly denied saying such a thing) In Islamabad, American officials told us about another story that identified--complete with photograph--a building in the city purportedly housing workers for the security contractor Xe (nee Blackwater). In fact, the building was home to Western aid workers--at least until they fled to safer environs that same day.
Stories like this fan the rising flames of anti-Americanism in Islamabad. A reporter traveling with me had hoped to meet a colleague at a coffee shop in central Islamabad, until embassy workers warned him that the shop was known to be under surveillance by people who might like to kidnap a Westerner. One embassy official told me that he enjoys dining out at Islamabad's restaurants--but when pressed admitted that he never lingers for coffee and dessert. "You try to be out within an hour," he said. (The same goes for activities like grocery shopping.) The Pakistani media surely also contributes to the growing harassment of U.S. embassy officials, who are finding their visas inexplicably denied and their vehicles pointlessly searched at security checkpoints around the city. So it's understandable that the vibe within the embassy compound--a deceptively bucolic place of walking paths and tennis courts that seems more college campus than embattled diplomatic outpost--feels so tense. After all, even behind the barricades and razor wire safety is not guaranteed. We all remember the 1979 storming of the U.S. embassy in Tehran. But less remembered is the way an angry mob overran and torched our embassy in Islamabad that same year. One U.S. Marine was killed, and it was a miracle that dozens more American lives weren't lost. (As Steve Coll recounts in his masterful book Ghost Wars, the Pakistani government barely lifted a finger to help.)
The cause of that deadly riot? False Pakistani media reports that the U.S. had orchestrated an attack on Mecca. Lies have consequences--sometimes deadly ones.
Posted by: john frum ||
12/23/2009 12:29 ||
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#1
tnr contributed to the anti Bush attitude the aided the anti american paranoia but now that their guy is in the white house it suddenly bothers them
note also the gratuitous comment about ann coulter. I am unaware of any conspiracies she has pushed.
My father subscribed to tnr for 20 years. When he died, my mom kept the subscription for another 9 years. I dropped it.
Posted by: lord garth ||
12/23/2009 16:09 Comments ||
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#1
This opens up all kinds of nasty international doors:
What does this mean? It means that we have an international police force authorized to act within the United States that is no longer subject to 4th Amendment Search and Seizure. The "property and assets of [INTERPOL], wherever located and by whomsoever held, shall be immune from search, unless such immunity be expressly waived, and from confiscation."
INTERPOL, an international criminal police organization, is now poised to reside above the United States Constitution - in a place of sanctity beyond our FBI, CIA, DIA, and all other criminal investigatory domestic organizations.
President Obama has just placed our Constitutional rights under international law.
One of the most lightly and egregious assassination of our citizens rights to date. I do not think people know how serious this really is. Yet...
Italy indicts CIA agents in abduction of terror suspects - Europe - International Herald Tribune
By Ian Fisher
Published: Friday, February 16, 2007
ROME An Italian judge ordered the first trial involving the U.S. program of kidnapping terror suspects on foreign soil, indicting 26 Americans Friday, most of them CIA agents, and also Italy's former top spy.
The indictments concerned the alleged kidnapping of a radical Egyptian cleric, Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, who disappeared near his mosque in Milan on Feb. 17, 2003. The cleric, known as Abu Omar, was freed this week from jail in Egypt, where he says he was taken and then tortured.
Despite the indictment, issued by a judge in Milan, it is unlikely that any of the Americans will ever stand trial here.
All the operatives, including the top two CIA officials in Italy at the time, have left the country. Moreover, Italy has not requested their extradition; if it did, there seems little chance that the Bush administration would agree.
But the indictment nonetheless was a turning point in Europe, where anger is high at the secret American program in which terrorism suspects were whisked away in a process known as "extraordinary rendition" in contravention of the law after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
In the past week, the Swiss government approved an investigation into the flight that is alleged to have carried Nasr from Italy to Germany, over Swiss airspace. The plane reportedly then flew from an American base in Germany to Egypt.
Late last month, a German court issued an arrest warrant for 13 people suspected of involvement in the kidnapping in Macedonia of a German citizen of Lebanese descent. There are also investigations into extraordinary renditions in Portugal and Spain.
Also in the past week, a European parliamentary committee issued a detailed report on what it said were "at least" 1,245 secret CIA flights in Europe, some of them involving extraordinary renditions.
The report
is particularly sensitive because it suggests forcibly that a number of governments knew of the flights.
"We believe there has been either active collusion by several EU governments or turning a blind eye," said a member of the EU Parliament, Sarah Ludford of Britain.
In Italy, the possible complicity of the government of Silvio Berlusconi, who was prime minister at the time of the alleged abduction, is one of the most difficult issues in the case. Among the Italians indicted Friday were Nicolo Pollari, who until earlier this year was Italy's chief of military intelligence, and his former deputy, Marco Mancini.
Pollari has denied responsibility, saying he cannot defend himself because he would need to use evidence that is classified as state secrets. The implication is that officials outranking Pollari, the nation's chief spy, gave approval for the kidnapping.
"We are very disappointed by the decision of the judge, being convinced that the lack of proof and the acquisition of documents covered by secrets of state demonstrates Pollari's innocence," Pollari's lawyer, Tittal Madia, said, according to the Corriere della Sera newspaper.
The case has several complications for Italian politics.
The government of Prime Minister Romano Prodi asked the Constitutional Court in the past week to review whether the prosecutor in Nasr's case, Armando Spataro, had overstepped his bounds by wiretapping the phones of Italian agents.
On Friday, Spataro said in a statement that he was "astonished" by the government's move and that he had followed all the laws in gathering evidence.
Meanwhile, a member of Prodi's government, Antonio Di Pietro, minister of infrastructure and a former corruption prosecutor, criticized the government for not having requested the extradition of the 26 CIA agents.
Prodi's government has not said whether it will make such a request. But the issue looms as a source of conflict between Italy and the United States.
While both American and Italian officials say the relationship between the two countries remains solid, it has been tested in recent months on several fronts. On Saturday, a big demonstration is planned in Vicenza, in northern Italy, where the Americans have asked to enlarge an existing air base, and Italian officials have recently criticized American actions in Iraq, Lebanon and Somalia.
Earlier this month, an Italian court ordered an American soldier to stand trial for the death in Iraq of Nicola Calipari, an Italian secret service agent killed in 2005 while securing the release of a kidnapped Italian journalist. As with the CIA agents, the serviceman is unlikely to be extradited to Italy.
#3
CD, you're reading it wrong. It isn't that Interpol is immune to the 4th Amendment. It's a diplomatic arrangement that prevents us from seizing their assets and information, and it's common, indeed expected, in other diplomatic arrangements.
The Russian embassy, for example, cannot be searched by the FBI. That doesn't mean that the KGB can search Americans in our country.
Posted by: Steve White ||
12/23/2009 14:43 Comments ||
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#4
Interpol is not a sovereign country, however. So giving it diplomatic privileges essentially allows it to act without oversight in the US, whatever the surface niceties.
I agree: CIA, military leaders (remember the Brussels threat to arrest Rumsfeld?) and anyone the Euros don't like.
United Nations Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the Specialized Agencies
21 November 1947
...
(ii) The words "specialized agencies" mean:
a) The International Labour Organisation;
(b) The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations;
(c) The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization;
(d) The International Civil Aviation Organization;
(e) The International Monetary Fund;
(f) The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development;
(g) The World Health Organization;
(h) The Universal Postal Union;
(i) The International Telecommunication Union
These all have immunity in all the countries they have facilities in.
The specialized agencies, their property and assets, wherever located and by whomsoever held, shall enjoy immunity from every form of legal process except in so far as in any particular case they have expressly waived their immunity. It is however, understood that no waiver of immunity shall extend to any measure of execution.
[Section 5]
The premises of the specialized agencies shall be inviolable. The property and assets of the specialized agencies, wherever located and by whomsoever held, shall be immune from search, requisition, confiscation, expropriation and any other form of interference, whether by executive, administrative, judicial or legislative action.
Posted by: john frum ||
12/23/2009 19:12 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
