Burnt Orange Report

Final Thoughts On UK Elections (From Me At Least)

By Andrew Dobbs

I don't mean to distract people from the passing of Rep. Moreno, things are sad around here and the Capitol is said to be like a ghost town. I share with everyone else in expressing my sorrow at this loss and I'll be praying for Moreno's family tonight.

The elections last night were exciting, interesting and have shook up Westminster in ways that are quite unexpected. Let's run down some of the big implications of last night.

First, while the Lib Dems continued in their growth, they are still clearly not going to be a viable government any time in the near future. They did gain 11 seats, giving them their biggest number of seats in the Commons since 1929, but the fact that most of the swing was towards the Conservatives and not the Lib Dems suggest that when people are looking for an alternative to Labour, they look to the Tories and not the Lib Dems. Still, as Kos points out in a Guardian article, they gained four points over 2001, 11 seats and came in second in 160 constituencies, 50 more than in 2001. They are growing, but they are still not the second party that they ought to be.

Secondly, this was about the best possible outcome for the Tories. No one expected them to win-- Labour's majority was just too big. Gaining more than 30 seats and cutting Labour's majority by almost 2/3 does suggest that they are back to life. Michael Howard should not be so quick about stepping down as leader, but Tories should hope that this gives them a much-needed shot in the arm and that new leadership will mean fresh ideas for the party. Labour came back when they spelled out a unique, creative and ambitious platform for Britain. New Tory leadership could do the same for their party and turn their resurgence into a government in the next election.

Third, Tony Blair will not be PM for much longer. He is likely to hand off power to his Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown. Brown has always looked a bit uncomfortable mouthing the platitudes of "third-way" New Labourism. If he takes a hard tack back to the Left, it could mean jitters in the economic sector and an economic downturn that would give a big opening to the Tories. It would also take the wind out of the Lib Dems' sails. Still, he is very popular with Brits and his current leadership of the Treasury has been very wise-- his granting independence to the Bank of England will be heralded as one of the best moves Britain made domestically in the course of the twentieth century. If he can keep his popularity up and continue on a moderate political course Labour could be the majority for the long-haul.

The war was clearly unpopular in England, and Blair's character was called into question. Things have changed in Britain-- Blair received the lowest vote total for a governing majority in decades and for the first time in British parliamentary history the number of qualified voters who stayed at home exceeds the majority won by the governing party. Blair is the lamest of ducks right now and Britain is about to be undergoing some serious soul-seeking.

UK Election Open Thread

By Byron LaMasters

Labour looks to win a third majority in a row for Tony Blair, although sharply reduced from their current majority. I'm watching the BBC coverage on C-SPAN. Let us know your thoughts.

To The Random Brit Browsing Our Site: Vote Lib Dem

By Andrew Dobbs

Tomorrow is Election Day in the UK, and British voters have an important choice in front of them. It isn't the choice that would seem most likely on the surface: whether you want a government led by Labour, Conservatives or Liberal Democrats. Tony Blair is going to win, period. It would take a monumental, unprecedented and completely unforeseen jump from the Labour Party to one of the others to ensure any other outcome. That is not the choice.

The choice isn't even about whether you think Tony Blair has done a good or bad job. The fact of the matter is he's been better than average. He exaggerated claims about Iraq even more than Bush did, and that was wrong (especially when there were solid reasons for going to war without having to lie) and many of his top proposals have been a bust (NHS waiting lists are still too long, hospitals are dirty, schools have become unmanageable). On top of that he has failed Britain on some pressing issues, introducing tuition fees in Britain's public universities, failing to address increased long-term care costs for the elderly, letting local taxes spiral out of control for those on fixed incomes. Despite all of this, Britain has seen 13 straight years of economic growth, and more people have jobs now than any time in the last several decades. And despite the bellyaching by various elements in the UK, he was on the right side of the war against terror, investing his nation's honor and resources in the effort to topple the regime of Saddam Hussein.

But the question shouldn't be about that. When you know that Labour is going to win, you are presented with a powerful opportunity-- the opportunity to realign the political order. Tony Blair's "New Labour" mantra changed the political divide in England and established a new consensus. Now there is an opportunity to return the Liberals to their classic position as the second party in the British system. British voters can listen to the clap trap that Tony Blair is throwing out there about how voting for Lib Dems will return a Tory government (though that is next to impossible), or they can cast their vote for a fast-growing, progressive-minded, increasingly trustworthy party-- the Liberal Democrats.

Imagine this scenario. Imagine if, tomorrow, the Lib Dems get 28% of the vote (the most they would have gotten in decades), the Tories get 30% of the vote and Labour gets 35% (with the rest going to minor parties). Using the BBC's nifty seat calculator, that would mean a solid Labour majority of 116 (though a 22 seat loss for the government), a two seat gain for the Tories and a 23 seat gain for the Liberals. What would the implications be? First, it would hasten Tony Blair's handing over power to the more social democratic chancellor Gordon Brown. It would also mean that the Tories would be seen as an increasingly unviable choice for government, while the Liberal Democrats are emerging as the second party of British government. Continued refinement of message, continued build up of resources and a little bit of discipline could mean that in 2010 the Liberal Democrats emerge as the second party in Britain.

A Labour/Lib Dem divide means that the questions won't be whether or not government should support the most vulnerable, whether or not tax policy should be progressive, whether or not education, health care and other necessities ought to be priorities of the Parliament; but rather how those noble goals ought to be achieved. Britain will be a better country for that.

This isn't to say that the Conservatives don't have some interesting ideas and priorities. I think that their rhetoric on immigration has been rather nativist, but I think that the issue must be addressed-- Britain's values are changing, their culture is being impacted in dramatic ways. They are having trouble assimilating thousands of poor immigrants and it is causing alienation that leads to a multitude of social problems. Something must be done and only the Tories have had the guts to say something, though their guts have gotten in the way of their hearts. Also, I am a skeptic of European integration, particularly for the least European of all EU countries- the United Kingdom. I think that it is in Britain's best interest to remain a part of the EU that keeps its fellow countries at a healthy distance. Only the Tories are a serious Euroskeptic party (without the frightening far-rightism of UKIP or BNP). But the Tories are unprepared to lead and their message is muddled. Better a tried-and-true Tony Blair or an exciting-and-fresh Charles Kennedy than a muddle-headed unreformed Thatcherite like Michael Howard.

In the end, a vote for the Lib Dems is a vote for the Lib Dems. It is time that they emerge as Britain's primary challengers to Labour and redefine the political system in the cradle of parliamentary democracy. Tony Blair will still be PM on Friday, but hopefully some Friday down the road, the ginger-haired Scot will get the opportunity.

Pope Benedict XVI

By Byron LaMasters

As you might imagine, I'm disappointed with the election of Cardinal Ratzinger as the next Pope, but it could certainly be worse. I agree with the Kos post that progressives ought to refrain from calling this guy a Nazi, because he was not a Nazi, and actually had the courage to stand up to the Nazi's on several occasions. Furthermore, as a 78 year old man, it is unlikely that he will serve nearly as long as John Paul II, and is most likely to serve in a more transitional role.

While I believed it unlikely that a socially progressive pope would be elected, I had hoped that the next pope would focus more on social justice issues such as poverty, hunger and HIV/AIDS. I still hope that is the case, as opposed to the pope focusing on controversial social issues, but we shall see. I'd like to hear your thoughts on this. Use the comment section as an open thread to discuss the new pope.

Update: Andrew Sullivan has some thoughts on the election today that are certainly worth taking a look at.

Why do Senator Hutchison's staffers love Marxist terrorism?

By Jim Dallas

The Mujahedin-el Khalq (MEK) are, to put it bluntly, not nice people. The State Department describes them as a foreign terrorist organization:

The MEK philosophy mixes Marxism and Islam. Formed in the 1960s, the organization was expelled from Iran after the Islamic Revolution in 1979, and its primary support came from the former Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein since the late 1980s. The MEK’s history is filled with anti-Western attacks as well as terrorist attacks on the interests of the clerical regime in Iran and abroad...

Nonetheless, that didn't stop some of Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison's aides from attending a MEK get-together in Washington yesterday, according to Nick Hoover at The Agonist.

(more below)

To be sure, the group invited dozens of senators and representatives, but only a few decided to show. Why? Consider:

Former members and friends of members of the group describe the organization, which insists its members be celibate, as a cult. "They take your individuality and beliefs and tell you that all the love you have must go to the leadership," Sametipour says. "That's how they make terrorists."

Ronak Dashti, 20, who was also introduced to a reporter by the Iranian government, said she was abducted in Turkey by MEK members who took her to Iraq. There, she says, she had to sign documents saying she had no right to contact her family and should not think about marriage. She and three other defectors described communal living, hours of menial work and nightly self-criticism sessions.

(USA Today, Thursday)

In 1991, MEK fighters were on the front lines of Saddam's brutal counterinsurgency campaigns in the Shiite south and Kurdish north. "Up until the fall of the regime, they were part and parcel of the Iraqi military. And they were heavily involved in suppressing the Kurdish uprising of 1991," the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan representative in Washington, Qubad Talabani, said yesterday.

...

Some congressmen shared Ms. Rajavi's position on the terrorist designation. Rep. Tom Tancredo, a Republican of Colorado, compared those gathered yesterday to America's Founding Fathers. Not all members of the Iranian opposition, however, have such fond words for the MEK. The organization has been left out of the nascent movement inside the country to press for a constitutional referendum.

An Iranian activist in Los Angeles, Roxanne Ganji, told The New York Sun yesterday, "They are definitely a cult, and that is a dangerous thing. If anyone goes to Iran and takes the pulse of the people, though, 90% would never allow them to go back. That does not mean the information they gave America was not good. But they are a terrorist organization. If the United States wants information, then they can get it from viable groups and not terrorists."

(New York Sun, "Iranian Group Asks State To Lift Terror Designation", pg. 8, this morning)

Contrary to what some may say, there are many opposition groups in Iran which refuse to work with the MEK on principle. So why would any thinking person support them?

"The enemy of my enemy is my friend," said terrorism expert Neil Livingstone at a news conference in Washington in February where he and several retired U.S. diplomats and military men unveiled a new organization, the Iran Policy Committee, whose goal is to overthrow the Iranian government by supporting Iranian opposition groups.

(USA Today, Thursday)

In 2003, the Washington Post reported that some senior administration figures would like to use the MEK as a proxy force in Iran, in the same manner that the Northern Alliance was employed against the Taliban in Afghanistan.

("Oil and The Coming War with Iran", Wednesday)

I am inclined to remind Senator Hutchison that this lovely theory worked out real well the last time we employed terrorists for geo-strategic purposes. And the time before that.

Harold Meyerson on Mexico

By Jim Dallas

From the Washington Post:

Democracy may be all well and good, but Lopez Obrador is just not Bush's kind of guy. As mayor of Mexico City, he's increased public pensions to the elderly and spent heavily on public works and the accompanying job creation. He's criticized the North American Free Trade Agreement as a boon for the corporate sector and a bust for Mexican workers. (As economist Jeff Faux has documented, while productivity in Mexican manufacturing rose 54 percent in the eight years after NAFTA's enactment, real wages actually declined.) He's opposed to Fox's plan to privatize Mexico's state-owned oil and gas industry -- a stance that probably doesn't endear him to the Texas oilmen currently employed as president and vice president of the United States.

Worse yet, Lopez Obrador's populist politics and smarts have made him the most popular political leader in Mexico today. The much touted "free-market" economics of President Fox have done nothing to improve the lives of ordinary Mexicans. Lopez Obrador's victory in next year's election would mark a decisive repudiation of that neo-liberal model. Coming after the elections of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in Brazil, Nestor Kirchner in Argentina and Hugo Chavez (repeatedly) in Venezuela, it would be one more indication, a huge one, that Latin America has rejected an economics of corporate autonomy, public austerity and no worker rights.

So, democracy in Ukraine? We'll be there. Lebanon? Count on us. Kyrgyzstan? With bells on. Mexico? Where's that? Maybe they should move to Central Asia, change their name to Mexistan and promise to privatize the oil. That's the kind of democracy the Bush guys really like.

America-bashing is not exactly a road to salvation, and there are plenty of folks who think Lula is doing a good job of accomodating global capitalism in Brazil (and frankly, I doubt Lopez Obrador would be a much of a real left-winger if he is elected, either). At any rate, regardless of whether or not you buy into Meyerson's cynical theory of U.S. - Mexican relations, we've claimed to be the indispensable democracy-promoting nation. It stands to reasont that watching a legal lynching in Mexico without comment is not exactly a bold, principled thing to do.

Mexican Democracy Watch

By Jim Dallas

In about a year, Mexico will have its first post-PRI presidential election. Lindsay at Majikthise brings our attention to what may be a less-than-spectacular turn of events: the upcoming impeachment trial of Mexico City Mayor Andres Miguel Lopez Obrador.

The PRI and PAN both would benefit greatly if the PRD were wounded by scandal. While Mexico is now a two-and-a-half party system, with the PRI contesting the PAN in the north and the PRD in the south, my gut tells me this is ultimately an unstable arrangement, and the likely result is probably a two-party system. Which two parties, though, is a big question.

Vicente Fox, of course, is barred from re-election by Mexico's constitution.

Anyone Surprised?

By Zach Neumann

This morning, the NY Times reported that U.S. intelligence pertaining to WMD’s in Iraq was patently incorrect. I don’t think this comes as a shock to anyone. Check out the story:

A report made public this morning concludes that American intelligence agencies were "dead wrong" in almost all of their prewar assessments about the state of unconventional weapons in Iraq, and that on issues of this importance "we simply cannot afford failures of this magnitude."

It adds, "The harm done to American credibility by our all too public intelligence failures in Iraq will take years to undo."

The Economist had something along these lines last week. I guess it goes without saying that the greatest tool in the war against terrorism is information. Given the fact that the application of conventional military force does little to halt the spread of non state militants, it is vital that we fully develop our special forces, elite police units and intelligence agencies. Despite arguments made to the contrary by the Bushies in the National Security Strategy (NSS), America’s primary response to the threat of terrorism is still regime change. This has not (and will not) work. Though I’m not a fan of Donald Rumsfeld, I think he realizes this to an extent. While he has (obviously) supported the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, he has also attempted to revamp the capabilities of the U.S. military to deal with unconventional threats. To a large extent, this has included major changes to our intelligence infrastructure. Hopefully, his proposals will be taken seriously (despite suffering a significant setback last week).

I think I'm going to be sick...

By Zach Neumann

It’s been confirmed. The United States has (and probably) is deporting terror suspects to foreign countries to be tortured by governments not bound by petty little things like due process of law. The NY Times reports:

Maher Arar, a 35-year-old Canadian engineer, is suing the United States, saying American officials grabbed him in 2002 as he changed planes in New York and transported him to Syria where, he says, he was held for 10 months in a dank, tiny cell and brutally beaten with a metal cable.

Now federal aviation records examined by The New York Times appear to corroborate Mr. Arar's account of his flight, during which, he says, he sat chained on the leather seats of a luxury executive jet as his American guards watched movies and ignored his protests.

The tale of Mr. Arar, the subject of a yearlong inquiry by the Canadian government, is perhaps the best documented of a number of cases since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in which suspects have accused the United States of secretly delivering them to other countries for interrogation under torture. Deportation for interrogation abroad is known as rendition.

In papers filed in a New York court replying to Mr. Arar's lawsuit, Justice Department lawyers say the case was not one of rendition but of deportation. They say Mr. Arar was deported to Syria based on secret information that he was a member of Al Qaeda, an accusation he denies.

I understand that certain constitutional provisions have to be circumvented from time to time in the name of national security. However, I question if this is one of those times. I am posting this because I find myself in something of an intellectual quagmire. While my small-l-liberal sensibilities are shaken when I read about this case, I still understand that the government needs to be able to deal with potential terrorists quickly. It seems there is no right answer here. More than anything, this article makes me sad because I’m beginning to realize that security and liberty are not completely compatible. While this conclusion may seem obvious to some, it is one I’ve just come to accept. I am deeply disturbed by all of this.

Arms Race with China?

By Zach Neumann

Things with the Chinese keep getting thicker. This morning, the NY Times reported that the European Union is probably going to move forward with plans to remove an arms ban on China:

Senior members of Congress from both parties emerged from a meeting with President Bush on Tuesday warning Europe that if it lifts its ban on arms sales to China, the United States may retaliate with severe restrictions on technology sales to European companies.

The warning came after Mr. Bush, on his trip to Europe last week, twice cautioned the Europeans not to lift the restrictions, in place for 15 years. His insistence was based, at least in part, on a new American intelligence assessment that Beijing is rapidly becoming better equipped to carry out a sophisticated invasion of Taiwan and to counter any effort by the United States to react to such an attack, administration officials and intelligence analysts say.

After the White House meeting on Tuesday, Senator Richard G. Lugar, the Indiana Republican who is chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, said that if the ban is lifted - as European leaders have said they plan to do in coming months - Congress could react with "a prohibition on a great number of technical skills and materials, or products, being available to Europeans." The ranking Democrat on the committee, Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware, called a lifting of the ban "a nonstarter with Congress."

Their statements reinforce warnings that Mr. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made in meetings with Europeans over the past several weeks that the weapons sales would amount to a transfer of even more sophisticated military technology to China. But European officials say that the concerns are overstated, and that they are considering a compromise proposal that would keep advanced technologies from being exported.

Although Mr. Bush and Ms. Rice have spoken publicly about the sale of heavy weapons, Pentagon officials say the biggest concern is the technology that goes with it, including radar and battlefield communication systems that could take China's rapid military buildup to a new level. And to make their case, the officials have begun to discuss how such technology would give China an increased ability to intimidate Taiwan with the threat of invasion if it moves too aggressively toward independence.

The motivations for the officials to discuss this intelligence in interviews over the past two weeks are varied, and certainly include concerns about how the Chinese buildup could affect American security interests. But the discussion also comes as Congress takes up Mr. Bush's new spending proposals, which devote a majority of supplemental funding to land forces and the war in Iraq, while missions related to perceived threats from China fall mainly to the Navy and the Air Force.

What is the EU thinking?!. Though, I hate to say it, I’m having a John Mearsheimer moment. I believe that it would be foolish for Europe or the United States to provide armaments to the Chinese government. Aside from blatant, continued human rights violations (which I am going to sidestep here), the Chinese have engaged in a massive naval buildup since 2002. As the article details, China is attempting to develop a military capabilities on par with those of the United States.

This is extremely dangerous. Though I could care less about preserving the “autonomy” of Taiwan, it is not in the best interest of the Atlantic powers to sell arms to an emerging power. With the world’s largest population and a rapidly modernizing economy, China will soon be able to rival the United States in the North Pacific. If their military expansion continues unabated, this power will take on global proportions, posing a significant threat to Western hegemony. In the long run, China’s expansion could throw the world back into a multi polar system, greatly increasing the chances for major power war.

Though I do not think we should make an enemy of China, certain actions must be taken to slow the growth of this potential future rival. They include: 1. Expanding and fortifying our Pacific Fleet. 2. Encouraging the remilitarization of Japan 3. Preventing the Chinese from acquiring sophisticated Western military technology 4. Encouraging the Chinese to hold off on expanding the size of their nuclear force (perhaps through subsidies and confidence building measures??) 5. Engaging the Chinese government through strong economic ties and improved diplomatic relations— it is only by making politicians in Bejing feel secure can we significantly slow Chinese military growth.

While the Bush administration is (rightly) concerned with fighting terrorism, I think they need to be aware that this is ultimately a temporary action based on passing circumstances. Very soon, I feel, the world will be plunged back into multi-power conflict, and we need to be ready for it.

Democracy in Egypt?

By Zach Neumann

Recently, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called off a visit to Egypt to protest the imprisonment of Al-Ghad opposition leader Ayman Nour. It looks like Hosni Mubarak is attempting to mount a response. I don’t know how sincere this is, but it seems that Egypt might be considering democratic reform.

President Hosni Mubarak asked Egypt's Parliament on Saturday to amend the Constitution to allow for direct, multiparty presidential elections later this year for the first time in the nation's history.

On the face of it, the unexpected proposal from Mr. Mubarak, a former Air Force general who has ruled Egypt unchallenged since 1981, represents a sea change in a country with a 50-year history of autocratic, one-party governments.

"The president will be elected through direct, secret balloting, opening the opportunity for political parties to run in the presidential elections and providing guarantees that allow more than one candidate for the people to chose from with their own will," Mr. Mubarak said, speaking live on television before an audience at the University of Menoufiya in the Egyptian delta.

Some opposition politicians and other analysts hailed the proposal as heralding a new political era for Egypt, the Arab world's most populous nation, while skeptics said they wanted to await the details to be sure that the eventual constitutional amendment would not create only the appearance of democracy, a commonplace in the region.

Again, I want to emphasize how skeptical I am about Mubarak’s sincerity. He has made it fairly clear on several occasions that he wants his son to succeed him. Moreover, all he has offered at this point is some feel good, pro-democracy rhetoric (perhaps to assuage the concerns of the United States). I’m going to keep following this one…

It Isn't Vietnam...

By Andrew Dobbs

If you don't read Christopher Hitchens, you are missing out. A strange bird- a radical Leftist of the Marxist variety who whole-heartedly supports the War in Iraq- his writing is among the most articulate and interesting you can read. From urging the imprisonment of Henry Kissinger for war crimes to lauding Susan Sontag, from arguing in a special Vatican proceding that Mother Teresa was a bad person to celebrating Paul Wolfowitz, you can almost certainly find something to agree with in his writing, and if you can't it is still interesting reading nonetheless. Much better than the reflexively propagandistic nature of most conservative writing and far more intelligent than the insipid sloganeering of the Left, he should be on everyone's reading list.

This week he has a thought-provoking piece that tears apart the "Iraq is the new Vietnam" meme limb by limb with devastating insightfulness. I'll quote just a bit before adding my own ideas on the matter:

Whatever the monstrosities of Asian communism may have been, Ho Chi Minh based his declaration of Vietnamese independence on a direct emulation of the words of Thomas Jefferson and was able to attract many non-Marxist nationalists to his camp. He had, moreover, been an ally of the West in the war against Japan. Nothing under this heading can be said of the Iraqi Baathists or jihadists, who are descended from those who angrily took the other side in the war against the Axis, and who opposed elections on principle. If today's Iraqi "insurgents" have any analogue at all in Southeast Asia it would be the Khmer Rouge.

Vietnam as a state had not invaded any neighbor (even if it did infringe the neutrality of Cambodia) and did not do so until after the withdrawal of the United States when, with at least some claim to self-defense, it overthrew the Khmer Rouge regime. Contrast this, even briefly, to the record of Saddam Hussein in relation to Iran and Kuwait.

Vietnam had not languished under international sanctions for its brazen contempt for international law, nor for its building or acquisition, let alone its use of, weapons of mass destruction.

Vietnam had never attempted, in whole or in part, to commit genocide, as was the case with the documented "Anfal" campaign waged by Saddam Hussein against the Kurds.

In Vietnam the deep-rooted Communist Party was against the partition of the country and against the American intervention. It called for a boycott of any election that was not an all-Vietnam affair. In Iraq, the deep-rooted Communist Party is in favor of the regime change and has been an enthusiastic participant in the elections as well as an opponent of any attempt to divide the country on ethnic or confessional lines. (Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who is not even an Iraqi, hates the Kurds and considers the religion of most Iraqis to be a detestable heresy: not a mistake that even the most inexperienced Viet Cong commander would have been likely to make.)

Hitchens was (and is) a committed opponent of the Vietnam War and supports the action in Iraq, so his commentary is a bit more enlightening than the Leftists who oppose both for bad reasons or Right wingers who support both for even worse ones. It basically boils down to the point that in Vietnam you had a popular nationalist movement that had the materiel and military support of two superpowers that was invaded by a misguided United States after they had already won and before they had really done anything worth invading them over. In Iraq, on the other hand, the "insurgency" is an unpopular minority of a minority (only a handful of tribal groups among the Sunni minority, really) that has no real territory of its own and has only pittance support from an impoverished Iran and an al Qaeda that is a ghost of its pre-Afghanistan War power. Furthermore, rather than fighting for an independent Iraq, they are fighting for a return of either Saddam Hussein or the establishment of a non-Kurdish Sunni theocracy- not something the 80% of the country that is either Kurdish, Shi'ia or Christian are really down with. And finally the insurgency and their two icons- Abu Musab al Zarqawi and Saddam Hussein- are both guilty of grievous crimes against their neighbors and the United States.

Insurgencies only win when they convince a sizeable portion of the population to support them, when they have steady sources of arms and other resources and territorial bases to launch their campaign from. The Baathist/Sunni Supremacist axis in Iraq has none of these, and with the successful conduct of elections this past weekend the people of Iraq have an outlet for their concerns that is far more peaceful and infinitely more effective than the insurgency. It is just a matter of time before they run out of fighters, out of weapons, out of money, out of patience and out of time. This Iraqi election was no propaganda ploy as 1967 Vietnam's was, and this "insurgency" is no Vietcong.

We're going to win this one, and it'll be something we can all be proud of.

More from Sudan

By Zach Neumann

The U.N. has reached definite conclusions about the violence in Sudan. The NY Times reported today that:

A United Nations commission investigating violence in the Darfur region of Sudan reported Monday that it had found a pattern of mass killings and forced displacement of civilians that did not constitute genocide but that represented crimes of similar gravity that should be sent to the International Criminal Court for prosecution.

In a 176-page report, the five-member panel said that its finding that genocide had not been committed "should not be taken in any way as detracting from the gravity of the crimes perpetrated in that region," and that "international offenses such as the crimes against humanity and war crimes that have been committed in Darfur may be no less serious and heinous than genocide."

The commission was appointed by Secretary General Kofi Annan in October to determine whether genocide had occurred in Darfur, in Western Sudan, where about 70,000 villagers have been killed and 1.8 million driven from their land.

It was also asked to determine how anyone convicted should be punished, and it answered by saying it "strongly" recommended that the Security Council refer the Darfur crimes to the international court in The Hague. It said the crimes in Darfur met the jurisdictional terms of the 1998 treaty creating the court.
That course of action is favored by most members of the 15-member Council, but the United States has said it will vigorously resist because it objects to the court.

The panel said the Sudanese justice system had proved unwilling or unable to pursue the crimes in what it described as a "climate of almost total impunity for human rights violations."
While the commission said that no evidence of an organized governmental act of genocide existed, it suggested that there might have been government officials and other people who acted "with genocidal intent." Only a court could make that determination, it said.

Many prominent politicians and academics have condemned the U.N. commission for its refusal to brand the tragic events in Sudan as constituting genocide. Though I can understand their dismay, I feel that the U.N. commission made a wise, if not popular, decision.

The term genocide was devised by Samuel Lemkin in the 1940’s to describe “a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves.” In creating the word genocide, Lemkin was attempting to give a specific label to the phenomenal crimes of the Holocaust. By all accounts, he was successful. Genocide was quickly adapted into popular usage and came to describe the routinized destruction of specific national and ethnic groups.

In recent years, Lemkin’s “word” has taken on unintended meanings as it has been used by policymakers to describe widespread violence against civilian populations. While I think it is of the utmost importance to capture the horrors that occur when a state makes war against its people (or against those of another state), such descriptions must be distinguished from act of genocide. In my mind, genocide is a crime that’s magnitude far exceeds that of massive slaughter. Tainted by fanatical racism, genocide represents the potential elimination of entire cultural and language groups—a loss to human civilization that has implications that extend far beyond physical death.

Getting back to Sudan, I do not think that the atrocities in Darfur constituted genocide. While I agree (with the U.N. commission) that the actions of Bashir et al. entailed violence on par with genocide, I think they took a bold step in making a distinction between tremendous slaughter and the systematic extermination of an entire national/cultural group.

Samantha Power’s book, “A Problem From Hell” influenced this post. I would recommend it to anyone interested in genocide.

Representative Government?

By Byron LaMasters

I'm pleased that the Iraqi elections were completed without widespread violence, however, I fear that the National Assembly will hardly be representative of the Iraqi people. Via Juan Cole are some Zogby Poll results:

Sunni Arabs who say they will vote on Sunday: 9% Sunni Arabs who say they definitely will not vote on Sunday: 76% Shiites who say they likely or definitely will vote: 80% Kurds who say they likely or definitely will vote: 56%

What would be the American equivalent of such results? Juan Cole adds more:

On the other hand, if the turnout is as light in the Sunni Arab areas as it now appears, the parliament/ constitutional assembly is going to be extremely lopsided. It would be sort of like having an election in California where the white Protestants all stayed home and the legislature was mostly Latinos, African-Americans and Asians.

Iraqi Elections

By Jim Dallas

Polls are slated to close in about 75 minutes (at 8 a.m. Houston time, or 5 p.m. Baghdad time).

Turnout is high in some places, low in others. There were several cowardly bombings in Baghdad, as well as other acts of violence.

Will the elections produce a clear winner? Juan Cole points to a poll that shows the UIA (the group associated with, et alia, moderate Shi'a clerics) to have a large plurality, but not a majority.

Nonetheless, perhaps the biggest issue for most Iraqis is the one that's not on the ballot: whether the U.S. should disengage.

P.S. Don't expect results any time soon. We're gonna have us a good ol' fashioned American-style election, with weeks worth of counting, accusations about accounting, possible recounts, etc.

Securing the blessings of liberty

By Jim Dallas

This new article in the occasionally-respectable New Republic is really all I have to say about why I am a dippy good-government liberal. Southern Nigeria may be as close to Hobbes' state of nature as we're likely to see these days (OK, except perhaps in Iraq or Afghanistan-outside-of-Kabul).

We've talked a lot about "Reform Democrats" around here; but sometimes it's worth keeping in mind that by world standards, America is already a pretty honest, virtuous, and efficient country. And I would tend to think that most everybody ought to be in favor of keeping it that way.

(Also worth pondering: should we increase our foreign aid budget? Would it be more effective and sincere than piecemeal efforts by multinational corporations? Or merely run into the same difficulties; to wit, corruption and a lack of security?)

The Manchurian Candi-debt

By Jim Dallas

Atrios is beating the foreign debt horse again. And this Kos diary seems to make things seem like they're ready to rumble.

My understanding is that the Chinese central bank's motive in buying so many U.S. bonds stems from the peg between the RMB and the dollar, and the likelihood that the failure to prop up the dollar would result in massive unemployment in China (or so I've been told). So it's not so much inspired James Bond-ian evil Chinese scheming (remember Goldfinger - the Chinese trying to destroy the U.S. dollar by irradiating our gold supply!) as it is political realism.

Nonetheless, it seems like we're being driven into a macroeconomic trainwreck by technocrats on both sides of the Pacific.

The Previous Wars on Terrorism

By Jim Dallas

For the younger readers, a brief reminder that terrorism has been an issue in politics since at least the 1950s, when Puerto Rican terrorists shot up Congress and tried to kill Harry Truman.

Some observers have noted the parallels between the 9/11 hi-jackings and earlier hi-jackings in the 1960s; and we now learn that the 9/11 scenario was actually considered by government terrorism experts as early as 1972.

(Additionally, we learn, the United Nations has been ignoring terrorism for just as long).

Mandela speaks out on HIV/AIDS

By Zach Neumann

Nelson Mandela once again displayed the courage and resolve that made him famous. The NY Times reports:

Nelson Mandela, who has devoted much of his life after leaving South Africa's presidency to a campaign against AIDS, said Thursday that his son had died of the disease in a Johannesburg clinic. The son, Makgatho L. Mandela, 54, had been seriously ill for more than a month, but the nature of his ailment had not been made public before his death on Thursday. At a news conference in the garden of his Johannesburg home, the elder Mr. Mandela said he was disclosing the cause of his son's death to focus more attention on AIDS, which is still a taboo topic among many South Africans. To keep the illness secret would wrongly imply that it is shameful, he said. "That is why I have announced that my son has died of AIDS," he said. "Let us give publicity to H.I.V./AIDS and not hide it, because the only way to make it appear like a normal illness like TB, like cancer, is always to come out and say somebody has died because of H.I.V./AIDS, and people will stop regarding it as something extraordinary."

I am glad to see prominent African leaders being upfront about the HIV/AIDS crisis. I hope that Mandela’s behavior will inspire others to take a more personal approach to victims.

Where's James Dobson when you actually need him?

By Nathan Nance

Guest post by Nate Nance

As much as I disagree with and am totally creeped out by James Dobson and his ilk in the Christian Right, I have to give them props for being able to raise huge amounts of money for their causes. you know, things like gay bashing and fundamentally altering the Constitution to take away freedoms. But they do raise money.

So where is the Christian Right and where is their money to help out with tsunami relief. Digby has a listing of several Christian Right Web sites that, as of today, still have nothing about where to send money or to donate anything. I mean, come on, a disaster of Biblical proportions, these guys should be all over this. The only person on the Christian Right I've heard mention anything about the tsunami was glad it killed so many gay Swedish people. What the hell?

Before I totally come off as a hypocrite because I haven't really mentioned anything about where to send donations (or send cash as our Dear Leader might say), I just assumed that you're all geeks like me and you play around with goofy Google searches in your spare time. If not, then this should take you where you need to go. I'm sure you've got at least five bucks in your checking account that can be spared for the Red Cross or one of the other relief agencies. I've heard members of the Indonesian govt. claim that 400,000 people lived in one affected area alone and that has been totally destroyed and there is no way to find out if anyone is still alive, so this 155,000 could be way below the mark. Not to mention the untold billions of dollars worth of damage.

This is a guest post from Nathan Nance. He can be reached at nate_nance@yahoo.com.

Who will Lead Iraq?

By Byron LaMasters

Juan Cole brings us the platform of the United Iraqi Alliance, the party most likely to win the upcoming Iraqi elections:

1. A united Iraq - land and people - with full national sovereignty.

2. A timetable for the withdrawal of the multinational forces from Iraq.

3. A constitutional, pluralistic, democratic and federally united Iraq.

4. Iraq that respects the Islamic identity of the Iraqi people. The state religion is Islam.

5. Iraq that respects human rights, that does not discriminate on the grounds of sects, religions, or ethnicities, and that preserves the rights of religious and ethnic minorities and protects them against persecution and marginalization.

6. Iraq that provides a climate of peaceful coexistence among Iraqis without preferential treatment for any group.

7. Iraq in which the judiciary is independent and in which justice and equality prevail.

Juan notes two key issues that are perhaps troubling to the Bush administration. First, the platform calls for a specific timetable towards the withdraw of U.S. troops. Later in the platform, Juan mentions that the party promises membership in the Arab League and the Organization of the Islamic Conference. That suggests the the new Iraqi government would join other Arab nations in non-recognition of Israel until those organizations reached a settlement with Israel. It's certainly worth reading the full post by Juan Cole to understand what sort of policies we can expect from a future Iraq.

Update: Juan Cole has more, and this certainly isn't promising.

Candidate name recognition doesn't appear very important, however. For security reasons, the actual names of most candidates on the 78 party or multiparty lists have so far not been released. This odd situation, in which the candidates are not known amonth before the election, attests to how dire the political and security situation in Iraq really is.

Is it just me, or does anyone else think that it's kind of hard to know who to vote for when you don't know who is actually going to be on the ballot.

60,000+ Dead

By Byron LaMasters

The death toll keeps going up from the earthquake in Sumatra the other day.

It's impossible for most of us to actually grasp the magnitude of such a tragedy. Like Charles, I have no words of my own to describe what people affected by this are going through. So, I decided to spend a few hours this afternoon scrolling through blogs of those who experienced the earthquake / tsunami first hand. Here are some of their words...

Sri Lanka 1:

The sheer brute violence of that single wave is staggering. Every house and fishing boat has been smashed, the entire length of the east coast. People who know and respect the sea well now talk of it in shock, dismay and fear. Some work to do this week.

Sri Lanka 2:

For those of you who don’t know: An earthquake shock Sumatra on Sunday morning registering 9.0 and causing a tidal wave that devastated most of the countries in the Indian Ocean. Sri Lanka is the worst hit with 12,000 presumed dead and still counting and two million at least displaced.

We need aid. We need food, clothes and bottled water. We need you to help. Red Cross and Oxfam are helping but we have local efforts here that you can all contribute to as well no matter where you are in the world.

There is no food staples in the city: people have either started hoarding food or have started to buy up all the food to donate it to the victims.

Tourism was our biggest drawcard and earner for our economy. The coastline hit was out stretch of tourist beaches. Our economy is suffering. We seriously do need help.

Sri Lanka 3:

Here in Sri Lanka, ground blocks began to emerge out of the floods, all but in a very neat mess. Buses were seen in the middle of the ocean, boats in the middle of the road and carriages on top of houses. In an arial view, It wouldn't be any different from a bunch of toys thrown all around. By daylight corpeses were lying almost everywhere and inspite of all the efforts made on rescuing the ones in need, many lives were hampered due to the lack of resources. As of today local authorities reported more than 10,000 deaths and the Tamil Tiger rebels reported 2,000 dead in the territory they hold in the northeast. But there are always facts in these figures which will never be uncovered, even with the greatest efforts yet to come.

Chennai, India:

I went to see if there is something that I can do for those people. I went when I got the first message that the Marina water has entered the city and that the water has come out till Mandaveli. I took my camera for any picture possibilities, mobile to keep in touch and some money. I wasn't sure if it was true. So it didn't occur to me that I should also carry something for those people.

But when I reached there, I realized that I couldn't have carried enough for all those people running out of their homes. Some drenched till their hips, some till their chest, some all over and some of them were so drenched that they had already stopped breathing. Men and women, old and young, all were running for lives. It was a horrible site to see. The relief workers could not attend to all the dead and all the alive. The dead were dropped and the half alive were carried to safety. Old women had to be carried in chairs or transported by rickshaws. People scrambled what they could from their homes and could not check if they had carried enough. There is a pic of a couple checking if they have carried enough in the middle of the road. Lucky couple! They could at least do that! Many could not carry anything from home, because they had to run for their lives. And many couldn't run for their lives, because they were already dead. Helicopters were hovering around to try and salvage the alive (if any). It was a sad scene. It is true that we as a nation are ill prepared for such crisis situations. But I couldn't even blame the authorities here. They were just taken aback by the gravity of the situation. It was just too much for them. The Police Station in Foreshore estate was submerged in knee deep water when I had been that side.

Java, Indonesia:

I spent the day away from the television and it’s disturbing imagery. Tonight, witnessing the local news coverage from Indonesian stations has forever etched the horror into my memory.

Once again, they are showing video and photographs that will never reach the major media networks. A few examples of what I’m seeing:

Military men pulling bodies from the waist high water, and stacking them in trucks like bags of rice.

Relief workers climbing trees to remove the bodies of those tangled in branches.

Unclothed bodies hanging from electric powerlines, caught at the waist.

More children and babies who’ve perished.

Rooms full of hundreds of corpse, lying uncovered.

Mothers screaming in agony while carrying their dead children in their arms.

Kiruba.com has a visual representation of the path of the tsunami, as well as a before and after picture of the Indian coastline. The damage and loss of life across the Indian Ocean are devestating, so if you are able, here are two places to go to find multiple links to places where you can make a donation to help those suffering from the disaster: Tsunami Help and Command Post.

A Victory for Democracy

By Byron LaMasters

It's a victory that both the American right, and the American left can celebrate, because this is a victory for democracy.

Some thoughts on foreign policy...

By Zach Neumann

In the most recent issue of Foreign Affairs Magazine, Yale professor John Lewis Gaddis says some interesting things about the Bush foreign policy. I thought I’d post them here (along with some of my own commentary). I’d like to get everyone’s input on these matters as they have a direct impact on the course our country will take over the next fifty years. This is going to be an extended-length post.

Neither Bush nor his successors, whatever their party, can ignore what the events of September 11, 2001, made clear: that deterrence against states affords insufficient protection from attacks by gangs, which can now inflict the kind of damage only states fighting wars used to be able to achieve. In that sense, the course for Bush's second term remains that of his first one: the restoration of security in a suddenly more dangerous world.

Those of you who know me personally are undoubtedly familiar with my interest in the much-talked-about globalization phenomenon. I am particularly interested in the effect globalization will have on the moral restraints that generally govern the nation state. With threats emerging from a variety of non-state actors, it seems that there is potential justification for the use of force against almost any entity that threatens the security interests of a nation state. Not only does this weaken human rights internationally, it also sets the stage for a world plagued by miscalculation, confusion and unnecessarily prolonged military conflicts. I think that Gaddis’ recognition of America’s vulnerability to terrorist attacks underlines a much deeper problem in the emerging system of “globalized” international relations.

But the traditional warnings governments had used to justify pre-emption--the massing of armed forces in such a way as to confirm aggressive intent--would not have detected the September 11 attacks before they took place. Decisions made, or at least circumstances tolerated, by a shadowy regime in a remote country halfway around the world produced an act of war that killed more Americans than the one committed six decades earlier by Japan, a state known at the time to pose the clearest and most present of dangers.

I agree. To begin with, America must develop its intelligence services to the point where potential threats can be assessed with a high degree of accuracy. That being said, intelligence will never be perfect. Though it is important that the United States do its best in evaluating the dangers it faces, we must be quicker to the “draw” if we are to survive. While Iraq has been something of a debacle, its potential alternative is/was much scarier. America must send the message that it will deal promptly with its potential enemies, regardless of their background or their construction.

The narrowest gap between Bush's intentions and his accomplishments has to do with preventing another major attack on the United States. Of course, one could occur at any moment, even between the completion of this article and its publication. But the fact that more than three years have passed without such an attack is significant. Few Americans would have thought it likely in the immediate aftermath of September 11. The prevailing view then was that a terrorist offensive was underway, and that the nation would be fortunate to get through the next three months without a similar or more serious blow being struck.

The Bush Administration has not done enough to prevent attacks on the United States. With poorly guarded nuclear weapons floating around Russia and other former soviet bloc states, it is imperative that border/port security be increased. Our continuing vulnerability to a nuclear “brief case” attack is overwhelming. Though I am not completely opposed to Bush’s interventionist policies, I feel that they have distracted the country from the more important tasks of deterring nuclear proliferation (see North Korea and Iran) and ensuring that we not fall victim to another major terrorist attack.

Pre-emption defined as prevention, however, runs the risk--amply demonstrated over the past two years--that the United States itself will appear to much of the world as a clear and present danger. Sovereignty has long been a sacrosanct principle in the international system. For the world's most powerful state suddenly to announce that its security requires violating the sovereignty of certain other states whenever it chooses cannot help but make all other states nervous. As the political scientist G. John Ikenberry has pointed out, Washington's policy of pre-emption has created the image of a global policeman who reports to no higher authority and no longer allows locks on citizens' doors. However shocking the September 11 attacks may have been, the international community has not found it easy to endorse the Bush administration's plan for regaining security.

Toys, Mines, Iraq and America

By Andrew Dobbs

If this doesn't make you proud to be an American and optimistic about our mission in Iraq, nothing will.

It makes me proud to have a loved one overseas.

Update: And before you start decrying me for linking to a blog that supports President Bush, realize that just because you disagree with a blogger's personal positions doesn't mean you oppose everything he or she says.

British Courts Take Out The Trash...

By Zach Neumann

A British court overturned the country’s main anti terrorism law today. The NY Times reports that:

Britain's highest court ruled today that the British government cannot indefinitely detain foreigners suspected of terrorism without charging or trying them, and called the process a violation of European human rights laws.

A specially convened panel of judges in the Law Lords ruled 8 to 1 in favor of nine foreign, Muslim men who have been in detention, most of them in Belmarsh Prison in London, for as long as three years. The prison has been called "Britain's Guantanamo" by human rights groups.
In its powerfully worded decision, the court said that the government's "draconian" measures unjustly discriminate against foreigners since they do not apply to British citizens and constitute a lopsided response to the threat of a terrorist attack.

The judges deemed it a clear violation of the European Convention on Human Rights, a declaration that complicates the British government's strategy on combating terrorism.

The ruling by the Law Lords, a panel of senior judges who sit in the House of Lords and act as the country's highest court, parallels a June decision by the United States Supreme Court that said "a state of war is not a blank check for the president."

Using the sharpest language of the nine judges, Lord Leonard Hoffman, said today the case was one of the most important decided by the court in recent years.

"It calls into question the very existence of an ancient liberty of which this country has until now been very proud: freedom from arbitrary arrest and detention," he wrote.

He went on to say that the government's actions posed a greater threat to the nation than terrorism. "The real threat to the life of the nation, in the sense of a people living in accordance with its traditional laws and political values, comes not from terrorism but from laws such as these," Lord Hoffman wrote.

"That is the true measure of what terrorism may achieve," he added. "It is for parliament to decide whether to give the terrorists such a victory."

The ground-breaking decision removes one of the government's crucial anti-terrorism tools and muddles its ability to deal with suspected foreign terrorists. It also forces Prime Minister Tony Blair, his cabinet and the Parliament to either modify the law, or release the men and do away with the law altogether. The law must be renewed next year and is scheduled to expire in 2006. Until the government makes that decision, the detainees will remain in prison.

This is interesting. With opposition to restrictive anti-terror laws growing on both sides of the pond, it seems something is going to have to change. Hurray for the common law, I guess. Any thoughts?

Islamists in Texas

By Andrew Dobbs

This is scary.

A group of respected "moderate" Muslim leaders, including one from the mosque a block away from where my mom used to live, gathered in Irving this weekend for a "Tribute to the Great Islamic Visionary." Who might this visionary be? Some moderate/progressive Muslim leader who will bring peace and development to the Muslim world?

Nope. They honored the Ayatollah Khomeini. The flier lauds the Ayatollah's "Islamic revolution in a world of hunger and oppression and outlines the true policy of non-alliance for the Islamic countries and countries in the near future, with the help of Allah SWT, will accept Islam as the only school for liberating humanity and will not recede nor sway from the policy even one step."

So let's parse this one. They are 1. celebrating the Islamic revolution in Iran, which has led to 2 and a half decades of support for terror against the United States and our allies, 2. urging other Muslim countries to refrain from working with the United States and other Western powers, 3. saying that Islamic governance is not only good, but is the only legitimate form of government and 4. stridency in the matter is needed. Terror, Islamic extremism and anti-Westernism all in one place- in Irving, Texas. Scary.

For those of you who don't think the War on Terror is a serious deal, its getting ever closer to home.

Update: I should have mentioned that I don't think that they should be shut down for saying these things- that is their constitutional right. But at the same time, one has to wonder if the "moderate" clerics are celebrating the Ayatollah, what are the "radicals" thinking? We should be keeping our eyes open to subversion and radicalism here at home.

And Christian fundamentalists are pretty scary too, but they use legitimate political channels to promote their beliefs. Islamic fundamentalists don't. That may be a function of their nations tending to be undemocratic, but at their core there is a huge difference between the two.

That just proves my point

By Nathan Nance

Guest Contributor Nate Nance

I probably didn't help my case by misspelling Musharraf in my last post, so I decided to bring out the big guns: The Pentagon's Defense Science Board.

While I was reading the Sunday Herald, I came across this article about the mistakes we've made in our foreign policy. To quote:

THE Pentagon has admitted that the war on terror and the invasion and occupation of Iraq have increased support for al-Qaeda, made ordinary Muslims hate the US and caused a global backlash against America because of the “self-serving hypocrisy” of George W Bush’s administration over the Middle East.

...

On “the war of ideas or the struggle for hearts and minds”, the report says, “American efforts have not only failed, they may also have achieved the opposite of what they intended”.

“American direct intervention in the Muslim world has paradoxically elevated the stature of, and support for, radical Islamists, while diminishing support for the United States to single digits in some Arab societies.”

The rest of the article is very shocking, if only for how much it criticizes the Bushies rather than reveal anything most of us did not already know. And I think it is paradoxical, since this report was pepared for Rumsfeld, who seems to be the only top-tier Cabinet official to have enthusiastic welcome in the White House.

I think they more than back up my earlier claim that Iraq is quicksand and that Bush led us there.

Nate Nance is a 21 year-old news/sports clerk at the Waco Tribune-Herald. He is also writer/editor of Common Sense a Texas-based Democratic Web log.

Hindsight's always 20/20

By Nathan Nance

Guest Contributor Nathan Nance

I doubt many of you are regular readers of my blog, so you have no idea how I feel about the war in Iraq or the war on terror in gerneral. You have no idea if I'm a liberal or if I'm off the scale socialist or conservative.

I think, in maybe getting to know me, we should talk about the war in Iraq, since it is the most pressing issue on our agenda. But, I'm going to do something a little different. Instead of telling you in my own words, how I feel, I'm going to let someone who was praised just this morning by Bush himself for his leadership in the war on terror, tell you. President Musharaf of Pakistan:

"I think it's less safe," Gen. Pervez Musharraf said on CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer." Asked whether he considered the invasion a mistake, the Pakistani leader said, "With hindsight, yes. We have landed ourselves in more trouble, yes."

...

However, Musharraf said he does not believe U.S. and coalition troops should pull out immediately. Only after elections are held and the situation stabilized should the United States consider a withdrawal from Iraq, he said.

"[An early withdrawal] would create more problems in the region," he said. "Now that we are there, we need to stabilize the situation."

Now, I have my bones to pick with Pakistan and the fact that he is a military dictator plays very much against him in my estimation. But he's right.

As an aside, Musharaf also admitted in this morning's Washington Post that they have no idea where Osama bin Laden is, they just know he is alive.

No matter how you felt before the invasion, I can't see how you can agree that this was a good idea now. The closest to sane rationale I've heard from my Republican friends so far is "We were going to fight him eventually anyway." I'm not sure why war was inevitable with him, especially with the sanctions working. So I can't see this as anything more than a mistake.

But I also don't see how one can just pull up stakes and leave. If all of a sudden there were no troops to keep what little order there is in place, that country would be worse than Beirut in less than a day. But as long as we are there, there will still be an insurgency killing U.S. troops and still focused hatred on us in the Muslim world.

That is the very definiton of a quagmire. It's like quicksand. Once you step in, you're stuck. No matter what you do, you're still going to sink. Bush walked us straight into this quicksand, and even if John Kerry had been elected, we would still be stuck. That is the scary, painful truth of it. Wiser men than I don't know how to get us out, and that's probably because there is no way out. The really scary, scary thing I find, is that if the oppurtunity did arise to leave without consequence, I don't think Bush would take it.

Nate Nance is a 21 year-old sports/news clerk (glorified intern) at the Waco Tribune-Herald newspaper. He is also writer/editor of Common Sense a Texas-based Democratic Web log.

Navy SEALS

By Karl-Thomas Musselman

The Navy SEALs have launched a criminal investigation into photographs that appear to show commandos in Iraq sitting on hooded and handcuffed detainees, and photos of what appear to be bloodied prisoners, one with a gun to his head.

Some of the photos have date stamps suggesting that they were taken in May 2003, which could make them the earliest evidence of possible abuse of prisoners in Iraq. The far more brutal practices photographed in Abu Ghraib prison occurred months later.

Was a culture of abuse put in place over time? Did it start with our supposed elite?

Also, Rumsfeld to stay as Defense Secretary as Tommy Tompson for HHS goes by the wayside.

Why Fallujah Matters

By Andrew Dobbs

I saw this article by Max Boot from the LA Times and I'd reccomend it to everyone- supporters of the war (such as this blogger, who has come to realize the justness of our cause) can use it to bolster their confidence in our mission and reflexive opponents should read it to understand that we ARE winning.

Nothing except a battle lost can be half as melancholy as a battle won.

-The Duke of Wellington (...)

It is right and proper to mourn the death of 71 Americans and the wounding of hundreds more. As Wellington realized, martial glory rings hollow when weighed against the cost in blood. But it is wrong to rush to the opposite extreme by assuming, as so much of the current commentary implicitly does, that war solves nothing and that all casualties are meaningless. In fact, many of the turning points of history have been battles, such as Wellington's victory at Waterloo, which ended for all time the threat of French expansionism in Europe. (...)

Coalition troops killed 1,200 to 1,600 guerrillas and captured more than 1,000. They uncovered 26 bomb factories, 350 arms caches (containing thousands of weapons), several chemical weapons laboratori