Blue Sun, everything you said in your last post can be changed to be this site and the kos and the Huff.no difference except the party….all these strange names too, purple girl orange butterfly, sounds like a sounds like an American Indian convention. your probably a bunch of rich white pissed off hippys, that fell into the establishment mold, now living vicariously through your radical TD persona…......

Blue Sun,

Thanks so much for your very informative posts. I appreciate them. Much of this I was already aware of, (specifically with the Kurds…our so-called ‘allies’) but you’ve provided an extensive breakdown/update.

Thanks again…

The funny thing about the wingnut wackaloon trolls who are now trying to infest all of the most influential progressive blogsites is that they are taking advantage of the freedom to differ from the “official ideology” that they themselves deny on their own sites.  Just try to be critical too often of any of the more lunatic posts (which is pretty much all of them) on the reactionary right-wing freerepublic.com (what an ironic name), and you will find yourself purged (as were all Guiliani supporters when the Freepers turned against him).

Lastly, our only “friends” in Iraq, the Kurds are supporting and sheltering Kurdish terrorists from the PKK who are sneaking across the borders into Turkey and Iran to commit terrorist murders and running back to their sanctuaries in Kurdish Iraq.  Our Kurds are doing for the PKK what the Taliban did for al-Qaeda.  Turkey is already involved in a low-intensity war with the Kurdish provinces of northern Iraq and Iran may well join in.

Now, the Kurds are in the process (some say the process is already a fait accompli) of illegally annexing the oil-rich province and city of Kirkuk, threatening all-out war between the Kurds of the area and the other ethnicities they are trying to ethnically cleanse - the Turkmen, Sunni Arabs, and Assyrians.

The autonomous region of Kurdistan consists of the governates (provinces) of As Sulaymaniyah, Erbil, and Dahuk.  However the Kurds are attempting to lay claim to Kirkuk, the Khanaqin and Kifri districts of Diyala, the Akra and al-Shekkan districts of Ninawa (with an eye on Mosul as well), the Touz district of Salah ad Din, and all of Wasit, despite the fact that Sunni Arabs are the majority in these governates, and Kurds are a small minority (often in the 20% range).

Meanwhile, Muqtada al-Sadr, who tried to avoid direct military conflict with the government and the U.S. and his militia, the Mehdi Army, are losing patience as the U.S. and Maliki take advantage of al-Sadr’s truce to attack and either kill or arrest his followers.  It is only a matter of time before al-Sadr gives up on the political process again and, along with several million poor Shi’ite followers, returns to violence.

Is the “Surge” working?  Only in the fevered ideological fantasies of the wingnuts who have been declaring “Mission Accomplished” every few months since the fall of 2003 and are now desperate to turn the Iraq debacle into a “victory” for the sake of McCain’s campaign before the November election.

The propaganda that the “Surge” is the latest incarnation of “Mission Accomplished” is patently nonsense.

Aside from the fact that most of the lessening of American combat deaths had little or nothing to do with the Surge, the Surge has completely failed to accomplish its sole stated objective, providing a six-month respite in violence so that the Iraqi factions could work together to form a “unity government.”

Right now, these factions are divided further than at any time since the war began.  The Iraqi government is dominated by the pro-Iranian al-Da’wa party of pro-Iranian Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and the even more pro-Iranian party of SIIC (also known as ISCI, nee SCIRI) of Abd’el Aziz al-Hakim.  The Iranians, who have been training, financing, supporting and protecting Da’wa and SCIRI for decades must be ROTFL seeing Bush being duped into supporting and helping to arm their own pro-Iranian puppets. 

Meanwhile, as the U.S. accuses Iran of arming and training militias, the only Iraqi militia receiving significant training and support from Iran is Maliki’s and Hakim’s Badr Brigade, whose soldiers return from their Iranian training to be immediately inducted into the Iraqi Army, Security Forces, and Police, where they receive additional arms and training from the naive Americans.

As for the Sunni Awakening and the Sons of Iraq, who have been accepting bribes and arms from the Americans since six months BEFORE the Surge.  They have been merely using us as the pro-Iranian Shi’ites in the government have been using us.  They used our arms and money to remove a pesky rival for overall Sunni power, the primarily native-born al-Qaeda in Iraq, while arming their own militias for their expected upcoming war with the Iraqi government - the Shi’ites whom the Awakening tribes refer to as the “Persians,” another acknowledgement that Maliki and Hakim are more the puppets of Iran than of Washington.

The Awakening and Sons of Iraq have already turned much of their violence against their own government and are ethnically cleansing the few Shi’ite communities left in the Sunni Triangle.  At least one of the factions has announced that it has left the coalition and is returning to war against the United States.

Meanwhile, instead of integrating the Awakening militias into the national Army and Security service, Prime Minister al-Maliki has been rounding up and arresting Awakening leaders by the hundreds.  At least 600 have been imprisoned recently in an attempt to destroy the Awakening and Sons of Iraq militias. 

Maliki is also demanding a U.S. troop withdrawal (coincidentally on Obama’s proposed timetable), which the Bush administration is trying to spin as their own idea.  At the same time, representatives of Maliki’s government are going back and forth to Tehran making mutual assistance and protection deals with the Iranians to take our place when we are gone.

Violence in Baghdad has lowered during the Surge (though it is rising again) primarily because the Shi’ite ethnic cleansing of 2006/2007 has driven the great majority of Sunnis out of their homes and neighborhoods and sent them fleeing into the countryside as well as into Syria and Jordan.  Now, Baghdad’s few ethnic conclaves have been walled in by the Americans with high concrete walls, and access is achieved only through heavily fortified gates maintained by the American military.  If the military subjugation of Baghdad is considered a “success” of the Surge, then the German subjugations of Czechloslovakia, the Sudetenland, Poland, France, etc. must be redefined as a success by the same standards.

continued with the Kurds…

Truthdig!!!! It is alarming that the word “Iraq” does not appear on your front page!
It is my opinion that Obama’s speech in the Tiergarten of Berlin was one of the greatest blunders of his campaign for the presidency. Why? Because the “surge” in Iraq has been a kind of success for President Bush as I will explain below. Ergo, Senator Obama should have returned directly from Iraq and should have given a major speech on Iraq. Regrettably he decided to impersonate JFK/Reagan in Berlin.
Now to the success or perhaps I should say “relief” for Bush. It is not the success that Senator McCain touts because it has nothing to do with “victory in Iraq” whatever that means. The “surge” has changed what was a shooting war essentially into an occupation without an end in sight. The terrible fact that our soldiers are still killed and wounded does not change that. Soldiers have always been killed and wounded in occupied countries whose people hated the occupier. Obama counters that the Iraqi government has not produced “its promised benchmarks” hence that the “surge” is therefore not a success. That is irrelevant because our presence in Iraq is now that of an occupying force which is for Bush a substantial, albeit still fragile success by the admission of his “commanders on the ground.” To solidify this success he badly needs a “pact” with Iraq which allows him and may bind his successor to continue the open-ended occupation under so-called “international law” but in violation of our Constitution if this agreement is not sent for debate and a vote to the Senate. The fundamental question is therefore no longer “is it worth the life or limbs of a single American soldier to continue the war in Iraq?” but “is it worth the life or limbs of a single American soldier to continue the occupation of Iraq?” By continuing to use the word “war” Obama is mired in the shopworn cliché that this is a war against terrorism. The occupation of Iraq must not disappear from the Obama-campaign because “it is the economy stupid.” “The occupation of Iraq costs billions of dollars monthly and that has a direct bearing on the economy, stupid.” By remaining silent on Iraq he admits a weakness. It is time for him to come out and say “I was wrong on the surge but we must now speedily end the occupation of that country” and tell us why.
  The second Iraq-issue on which Obama must be grilled is his distinction between “combat units” and “non-combat units.” To him that may be obvious because it is a U.S. army-generated classification. To me it is far from clear-cut because both types of soldiers are armed and trained to fight and kill. To an Iraqi the distinction must be completely insane. Both are armed and can kill him, his wife, and children if not in combat then at a checkpoint anywhere in his country. It is no secret why the Bush administration does not use the term “enemy combatant” for Iraqis that attack American soldiers because if they did, Iraqi’s would be justified to call every armed foreign soldier in Iraq an “enemy combatant” and lock him/her up indefinitely in Abu Ghraib if they could. In fact, as long as there is no U.S. Senate ratified peace treaty with Iraq the Geneva Convention on warfare states that every Iraqi is justified to kill as many foreign soldiers as he/she can without committing a war crime. If an Iraqi asked Obama “what is the difference between a combat unit and a non-combat unit?” is Obama going to answer: “the latter is a sort of armed Peace Corps?”

Brava MonteyMarket!!!

By montymarket, August 22 at 10:04 am #

“..The trolls seem to have dug deep into this site, notice that?  But they’re slick.  Don’t come right out for McCain, but chip away after Obama.  Try to make you think there’s no difference between the two.  So, be disappointed, you Dems, and stay home rather than vote for Obama.”..

~~~~~

This is EXACTLY what I’ve been trying to articulate, and you just did it so much better!!!

Indeed the trolls have dug very, very deep…so deep as to have done their best to chip away at the foundation.

And let me tell you, calling them out will bring on the wrath of the fire, brimstone, and everything else they can pitch. I’ve been called a bigot and a racist so many times I’ve lost track. It’s totally laughable to anyone who knows me, but that doesn’t stop ‘em.

And yep, they’re slick about it. Just not slick enough.

Thanks for explaining the mechanics of the techniques. Words had so far failed me.

the tragedy is: both parties are 1; they are following a time table made long ago: Bush Sr tried to get NAU & NAFTA thru; couldn’t; (rep) Clinton (dem) DID so; Mexicans lost their land & water rights in Mexico; Civil war is what Newsmax calls it; drug war is what is presented to the people; THIS is the land they lost; NOT the “Absolut” map our politicians (both parties) are trying so hard to jam down our throats; Bush jr (rep) signed treaties to allow Canada’s & Mexico’s armies into our country in time of civil unrest; BOTH parties are “quiet” on topic of illegals; Geraldo Rivera on Jay Leno show promoting his book “hispanic” said “they” have not yet decided whether or not blacks or browns will have the roofing jobs; Leno also commented “you know they call Germany the Fatherland. BE ADVISED! THIS is the reason Clinton tried so desperately to get the Pres; the “change” Obama “promises” Congress snarls it will be up to US what changes are made; this goes to Gov’s folks: this is why they are trying so desperately to ban guns. STICK to yours: figurtively & literally. Become informed & knowledgeable, FAST! LEARN why other countries talk Hitler how it was done then & how it is being done in USA today; & why THEY are calling it genocide.

By G.Anderson, August 22 at 5:48 am

“.. American’s just may not be real enough to face the truth. Lies and Dreams are much more comforting, than the truth because they require no effort, no courage, just a closing of the mind…”

~~~~~~

You’ve said it all here G. Anderson. It’s a heartbreaking truth, since it means that even those of us who have exerted the courage to hold on to the reality, will perish with all of the others.

Doesn’t seem fair at all, does it?

It should be obvious to many of us that we have gotten to a point in this country where change may no longer be possible.

Where the competing political delusions, instead of political realities, make it next to impossible for our country, to solve the problems it faces.

American’s just may not be real enough to face the truth. Lies and Dreams are much more comforting, than the truth because they require no effort, no courage, just a closing of the mind.

Without real change this country will continue it’s slide into the abyss.

Who the Gods wish to destroy they first make insane.

Obama has already lost. Everyone knows it. And when he names his vice-president (Why this is such a big secret is beyond me), his campaign will go further downhill. He just doesn’t get it.

•  “…want to vote for Obama, but don’t feel they know him yet. Their discomfort, he insists, is not about Obama’s race—These are good people,” Doyle said of voters who keep sending him to Congress—but a more general sense that Obama represents something very new.”

Oh the irony. I can hardly take it. If this is sincere, (and I’m inclined to believe that it is) what’s the excuse for the loud and frequent complaints of those who keep hollering that Obama ISN’T ‘new’ and NOT about change? I guess THOSE are the ones for whom it IS about Obama’s race. (or at least resentment). And of course THAT’S what I suspected all along, at least from the posters who make those complaints here. The folks Doyle is talking about don’t likely hang out on websites.

•  “And given the priority of the economy to voter choices, it’s surprising that Obama has not done more to link the hundreds of billions spent in Iraq to the nation’s current economic difficulties.”

Well, I certainly agree with this. I don’t know why he hasn’t mentioned this either. On the other hand, he hasn’t been doing a whole lot of actual campaigning that I’m aware of, since his return from the Middle East and Europe, although I did see him talking somewhere today, about his ONE house, versus the number of homes that McCain is unsure he has himself.

Meantime, while it might be a good idea to take a dissected sliver here and there from the old Willy model at winning hearts and minds, that can also be the same as handling dangerous chemicals without being suited up in bio-hazard gear.

As it is, the Clinton’s are far too close to his campaign, even if only by proxy. I think they and anybody ever connected to them need to be quarantined until after November.