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I read a book called Bagdad without a Map, A journalist trvelled through the middle East. early 80s it puts a human face on those people , and shows the bizare world of the dictatorships.
Hey Migo, I try not to get agitated here but I do, it must sound like a broken record sometimes.
Yes, we should have treated the people of Iraq as if they were American citizens. I dont think we did.
"kill'em with kindness" Can you imagine what 500 billion in kindness would do in Afganistan where the average income is 100 us dollars per year. its an incredible waste of money and our lifeblood to use a republican term. The Iraqis only produced 20 billion in oil per year so the amount we are spending there is rediculous also...
Nice to have you join in. I'm Shawn from Seattle.
Can He buy miss teen middle East. I hear the miss teen Usa girls wont fuck him for the crown anymore.
You should go poll some Iraqis . or just go walk down the street in bagdad We would like to see if sunis or shia are more friendly to you. you first take before and after pictures.....Ha Ha Ha and you care about there freedom.
School kids probably make them
Dems are Blood sucking pigs with no clue as what to do in Iraq, but that doesn't change the fact that Iraq is a lost cause . Hilary Cunton will be salivating over the patriot act if she wins, the big government dems will be free to do whatever they want If they get the Presidency , house ,senate and the new scratch and sniff constitution.. well have bread lines within ten years.. I'd rather have a plane fly into a building than loose the constitution.
Saudi arabia is Suni Iran is shia this is the tricky part of the Iraq mess . we normaly would support the strongest side in a new state,(Shia) but it is against our interest in this case. but I think the new plan is to support the shia and let the sunnis get pounded into submision. The only solution really. Sunis need to be hellped to relocate to other suni countries and this would be cheaper than babysiting a gang war.
Shia Arabs formed vigilante death squads to expel all Sunni Arabs" Shia are ghetto dwellers The only tool they have is violence. And why do you care about them anyway? are they going to swim accross the atlantic? We support the dictatorship in Saudi Arabia. The Saudi government gave direct support to the 19 high jackers, and Bush Cheney Rice were having lunch there last week. Bush had 23 pages from 911 report sealed all had to do with Saudi Arabia. Iraq has no democracy, it has a police state, run by a pupet government controlled by the Bush administration.
The new policy in Iraq is to let the Shiite government loose, and put a smiley face on whatever slaughter takes place, and help them do it. Every ten minutes today the AP would update that story and it would change. The Iraqi government sources cant be trusted and our military sources are not that much better. We lost two soldiers and a helicopter. who in Iraq is not armed at this point, so that cover story could be used to attack any group. The Shiite death squads will let us know who the cult members are, and The US military will take them out.
"They intended to occupy Najaf, then topple the Iraqi government and kill all the great religious leaders," he said.
Some of the gunmen brought their families with them in order to make it easier to enter the city, al-Fatlawi said. "The women have been detained," al-Fatlawi said.
Abtan said most of the gunmen who were killed were left on the battlefield and would be taken for burial on Tuesday.
"There were families with them, women and children," he said.
The U.S. military, which turned over provincial control to Iraqi security forces in Najaf last month, touted the operation as a victory for Iraqi forces, singling out their efforts to recover the bodies of two U.S. soldiers killed when their helicopter went down during the fighting.
"This is an example of a promise kept," Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks, deputy commander of the Multi-National Division — Baghdad and the 1st Cavalry Division, said. "Everything worked just as it should have."
The Iraqi government spokesman, Ali al-Dabbagh, said the raid on Sunday in date-palm orchards on the city's outskirts was aimed against a group called the Jund al-Samaa, or Soldiers of Heaven, which appeared to have had links to
Saddam Hussein loyalists and foreign fighters. Officials said the cult was hoping to force the return of the "hidden imam," a 9th-century Shiite saint who Shiites believe will come again to bring peace and justice to the world. (well they must have been some crazys)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070129/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq;_ylt=Apq7rwGOqm39PX2bst7GHHhn.3QA;_ylu=X3oDM....
The leader of an Iraqi cult who claimed to be the Mahdi, a messiah-like figure in Islam, was killed in a battle on Sunday near Najaf with hundreds of his followers,
Iraq's national security minister said on Monday.
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Women and children who joined 600-700 of his "Soldiers of Heaven" on the outskirts of the Shi'ite holy city may be among the casualties, Shirwan al-Waeli told Reuters. All those people not killed were in detention, many of them wounded.
Iraqi troops, backed by U.S. forces, confronted the group after learning it was planning an attack on the Shi'ite clerical establishment in Najaf on Monday.
"One of the signs of the coming of the Mahdi was to be the killing of the Ulema (hierarchy) in Najaf," Waeli said. "This was a perverse claim. No sane person could believe it."
Authorities have been on alert for days as hundreds of thousands of Shi'ite Muslims massed in the area to commemorate Ashura, the highpoint of their religious calendar, amid fears of attacks by Sunni Arab insurgents linked to al Qaeda.
But Sunday's battle involved a group of a different sort, a cult which Iraqi officials said included both Sunni and Shi'ite Muslims as well as foreigners.
"He claimed to be the Mahdi," Waeli said of the cult's leader, adding that he had used the full name Mahdi bin Ali bin Ali bin Abi Taleb, claiming descent from the Prophet Mohammad.
He was believed to be a 40-year-old from the nearby Shi'ite city of Diwaniya: "He was killed," Waeli said.
The final death toll, estimated by other Iraqi officials at 300 gunmen, was still being calculated, Waeli said, putting the initial figure at about 200. Searchers were still scouring the area where U.S. tanks, helicopters and jets reinforced Iraqi troops during some 24 hours of fighting.
Though Sunnis and Shi'ites are engaged in an embryonic sectarian civil war in Iraq, there have been instances in Islamic history where groups drawn from both communities have challenged the authority of the existing clerical leadership.
"SOLDIERS OF HEAVEN"
The U.S. military declined to provide details. It officially handed over responsibility for Najaf province, in southern Iraq, to Iraqi security forces last month and withdrew most U.S. troops, to be recalled only to help in emergencies.
A government statement said the group was planning "a dangerous criminal act" in Najaf.
""An ideologically perverted group ... tried to insult an Islamic holy symbol, the Imam Mahdi, and use him as an ideological base to recruit followers," the statement said.
Waeli said the death toll among Iraqi forces was around 10 soldiers and police. Najaf's police chief was wounded, he said.
Two U.S. soldiers were killed when their attack helicopter came down during the fighting, the U.S. military said. Iraqi officials and witnesses said it appeared to have been shot down.
Some of the fighters wore headbands describing themselves as "Soldiers of Heaven," Iraqi officials said. It was not clear how many women and children were present: "It is very sad to bring families onto the battlefield," Waeli said.
When police first approached the camp and tried to call on the group to leave, their leader replied: "I am the Mahdi and I want you to join me," Waeli said, adding: "Today was supposed to be the day of his coming."
Other Iraqi officials said on Sunday that a man named Ahmed Hassani al-Yemeni, who had been working from an office in Najaf until it was closed down earlier this month, had assembled the group, claiming to be the messenger of the Mahdi.
Among previous violent instances of people saying they were the Mahdi were an opposition movement to British imperial forces in Sudan in the 1880s and a group of several hundred, including women, that took over the Grand Mosque in Mecca in 1979.
There are precedents in Islamic history for such violent cults. They have declared temporal Muslim leaders illegitimate infidels and have drawn followers from both Sunni and Shi'ite believers, proclaiming a unity of inspiration from Mohammad.
As many as 2 million pilgrims gathered in Kerbala, 70 km (40 miles) north of Najaf, for the climax of Ashura on Monday and 11,000 troops and police were deployed.
More than 100 people were killed there by suicide bombers three years ago, as Shi'ites marked the first Ashura after the end of restrictions imposed by
Saddam Hussein's Sunni-led state.
(Additional reporting by Mariam Karouny, Aseel Kami, Ross Colvin, Claudia Parsons and Alastair Macdonald in Baghdad)
The dood brought suni and shia together and hes called a cult? He was going to attack.. We've heard that before...
great site
Thats amazing. They leak as a tactic. "A senior official", no news story should be allowed to use that phrase ever again
The sun just came out here in Seattle after three months of rain, it's perking me up.. Big Easy to Big Empty I'll check it out.
The private security people are basicaly pirates, they have no flag and no laws. 70% of the reconstruction money went to private security. It's a scam... The four men torn to shreds in Falluga were blackwater employees. The Iraqis should have rebuilt there own country..
Blackwater You pay them but they work for Cheney and bush. The owners bumper sticker is disturbing.
Dangerous...making the military a fully privatized entity through blackwater USA, a huge supporter of the republican party.. this new corp will have domestic as well as foreign duties...and the democratic party is doing nothing to stop it.
I eat out of a dumpster, I live behind an abortion clinic so I do eat good. Mostly Christian fetuses for diner tonight The muslims dont seem to use abortion that much.
I'm Homeless, So I'm hoping someone will destroy my way of life. I eat out of a dumpster, I live behind an abortion clinic so I do eat good. Mostly Christian fetuses for diner tonight The muslims dont seem to use abortion that much.
Radical muslims want to destroy our way of life. So last week Bush Cheny Rice the new sec of defence went to meet with The Soudi (Soadi)Arabian (Government) To get there help... Do you see a problem with that Wail bait?
Your lack of response to the Question is as good an answer as you need to give.
None of the 19 hijackers were from Iraq. There was not one terrorist in Iraq untill the US invasion. An honest person could have rebuilt Iraq peacfully, Bush n Co. just wanted the Oil. and the Millitary contract money... Our troops should have left the next day. instead they went kicking in doors and twist tie ing 6 year old girls . our millitary should be ashamed of itself and our soldiers should be treated with contempt when they return home. They failed.
which radical Islamist side are we taking in this conflict? Shia or Sunni?
whoever will give bush n co. the most oil contracts i guess, or buy the most armaments from us...
yeah I'm voting for independant cadidates , I think the Democrat and repblican national comitties are like the mob now. its time to clean house.. today Sean Penn at the war protest said if Democrats issue nonbinding anti war legislation then they will get kicked out in 08 also I was happy to hear that..
When the 19 terrorists from soudi arabia attacked on 911 we had 20,000 troops in soudi arabia protecting that dictatorship,, so can you say that we want to destroy there way of life? one of the highjackers was from yemen,, the uss cole was in yemen , do you see any muslim war ships in our ports? do you see muslim troops in our country defending brutal dictators?
Ala Akbar, Ala willing we will see the end of the Oil Crusade soon. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070128/ap_on_re_us/iraq_protest
Report: U.S. supplied the kinds of germs Iraq later used for biological weapons
WASHINGTON (AP) — Iraq's bioweapons program that President Bush wants to eradicate got its start with help from Uncle Sam two decades ago, according to government records getting new scrutiny in light of the discussion of war against Iraq.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sent samples directly to several Iraqi sites that U.N. weapons inspectors determined were part of Saddam Hussein's biological weapons program, CDC and congressional records from the early 1990s show. Iraq had ordered the samples, claiming it needed them for legitimate medical research. (Related story: A look at U.S. shipments of pathogens to Iraq)
The CDC and a biological sample company, the American Type Culture Collection, sent strains of all the germs Iraq used to make weapons, including anthrax, the bacteria that make botulinum toxin and the germs that cause gas gangrene, the records show. Iraq also got samples of other deadly pathogens, including the West Nile virus.
The transfers came in the 1980s, when the United States supported Iraq in its war against Iran. They were detailed in a 1994 Senate Banking Committee report and a 1995 follow-up letter from the CDC to the Senate.
The exports were legal at the time and approved under a program administered by the Commerce Department.
"I don't think it would be accurate to say the United States government deliberately provided seed stocks to the Iraqis' biological weapons programs," said Jonathan Tucker, a former U.N. biological weapons inspector.
"But they did deliver samples that Iraq said had a legitimate public health purpose, which I think was naive to believe, even at the time."
The disclosures put the United States in the uncomfortable position of possibly having provided the key ingredients of the weapons America is considering waging war to destroy, said Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va. Byrd entered the documents into the Congressional Record this month.
Byrd asked Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld about the germ transfers at a recent Senate Armed Services Committee hearing. Byrd noted that Rumsfeld met Saddam in 1983, when Rumsfeld was President Reagan's Middle East envoy.
"Are we, in fact, now facing the possibility of reaping what we have sown?" Byrd asked Rumsfeld after reading parts of a Newsweek article on the transfers.
"I have never heard anything like what you've read, I have no knowledge of it whatsoever, and I doubt it," Rumsfeld said. He later said he would ask the Defense Department and other government agencies to search their records for evidence of the transfers.
Invoices included in the documents read like shopping lists for biological weapons programs. One 1986 shipment from the Virginia-based American Type Culture Collection included three strains of anthrax, six strains of the bacteria that make botulinum toxin and three strains of the bacteria that cause gas gangrene. Iraq later admitted to the United Nations that it had made weapons out of all three.
The company sent the bacteria to the University of Baghdad, which U.N. inspectors concluded had been used as a front to acquire samples for Iraq's biological weapons program.
The CDC, meanwhile, sent shipments of germs to the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission and other agencies involved in Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs. It sent samples in 1986 of botulinum toxin and botulinum toxiod — used to make vaccines against botulinum toxin — directly to the Iraqi chemical and biological weapons complex at al-Muthanna, the records show.
Botulinum toxin is the paralyzing poison that causes botulism. Having a vaccine to the toxin would be useful for anyone working with it, such as biological weapons researchers or soldiers who might be exposed to the deadly poison, Tucker said.
The CDC also sent samples of a strain of West Nile virus to an Iraqi microbiologist at a university in the southern city of Basra in 1985, the records show.
Ha ha, we messed it up..
Sen. Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va., posed this question to the Senate on Thursday, based on documents obtained from different federal agencies.
"We have a paper trail," Byrd said. "We not only know that Iraq has biological weapons, we know the type, the strain, and the batch number of the germs that may have been used to fashion those weapons. We know the dates they were shipped and the addresses to which they were shipped.
"We have in our hands the equivalent of a Betty Crocker cookbook of ingredients that the U.S. allowed Iraq to obtain and that may well have been used to concoct biological weapons."
Those shipments included:
Between 1985 and 1988, the nonprofit American Type Culture Collection made 11 shipments to Iraq that included a "witches' brew of pathogens," including anthrax, botulinum toxin and gangrene. All shipments were government-approved.
Between January 1980 and October 1993, the federal Centers for Disease Control shipped a variety of toxic specimens to Iraq, including West Nile virus and Dengue fever.
The U.S. Commerce Department and CDC provided lists of these shipments. "The Defense Department ought to have the same lists, so that the decision-makers will know exactly what types of biological agents American soldiers may face in the field," Byrd said.
"At last week's Armed Services Committee hearing, Secretary [Donald] Rumsfeld said he had no knowledge of any such shipments and doubted that they ever occurred. He seemed to be affronted at the very idea that the United States would ever countenance entering into such a deal with the devil.
"Secretary Rumsfeld should not shy away from this information. On the contrary, he should seek it out," Byrd said.
In its Sept. 23 edition, Newsweek magazine published an article discussing the viruses, poisons and gases that the U.S. sent to Saddam Hussein in the mid-1980s. At that time, the U.S. regarded Iraq as a potential ally against Iran's Ayatollah Khomeni.
Byrd criticized Rumsfeld for failing to answer questions he asked last week about these shipments to Iraq during an Armed Services Committee hearing.
"I repeat today what I said to him then," Byrd said. "In the event of a war with Iraq, might the United States be facing the possibility of reaping what it has sown?"
Calls to the White House press office on Thursday afternoon were referred to the Department of Defense, where no one returned a call. One woman at the White House asked, "How do you spell Byrd?"
Federal documents and a United Nations Security Council report document a direct connection between periods when Iraq received toxins and viruses from the U.S. and the periods when Iraq developed biological weapons.
Byrd closed his speech by asking what the future holds.
"The role that the U.S. may have played in helping Iraq to pursue biological warfare in the 1980s should serve as a strong warning to the president that policy decisions regarding Iraq today could have far reaching ramifications on the Middle East and on the United States in the future.
"In the 1980s, the Ayatollah Khomeni was America's sworn enemy, and the U.S. government courted Saddam Hussein in an effort to undermine the Ayatollah and Iran. Today, Saddam Hussein is America's biggest enemy, and the U.S. is said to be making overtures to Iran."
The Bush administration is also discussing whether to arm groups of ethnic dissidents, such as the Kurds, in Iraq.
"Could the U.S. be laying the groundwork for a brutal civil war in Iraq? Could this proposed policy change precipitate a deadly border conflict between the Kurds and Turkey?" Byrd asked.
He again urged caution. "Decisions involving war and peace," he said, "should never be rushed or muscled through in haste. Our founding fathers understood that, and wisely vested in the Congress, not the president, the power to declare war."
Byrd said Congress must consider Bush's requests for new war powers "carefully, thoroughly, and on our own timetable ... and avoid the pressure to rush to judgment on such an important matter."
(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.)
Records Show US Sent Biological Weapons Germs to Iraq
by Matt Kelley
WASHINGTON –– Iraq's bioweapons program that President Bush wants to eradicate got its start with help from Uncle Sam two decades ago, according to government records getting new scrutiny in light of the discussion of war against Iraq.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sent samples directly to several Iraqi sites that U.N. weapons inspectors determined were part of Saddam Hussein's biological weapons program, CDC and congressional records from the early 1990s show. Iraq had ordered the samples, claiming it needed them for legitimate medical research.
The CDC and a biological sample company, the American Type Culture Collection, sent strains of all the germs Iraq used to make weapons, including anthrax, the bacteria that make botulinum toxin and the germs that cause gas gangrene, the records show. Iraq also got samples of other deadly pathogens, including the West Nile virus.
The transfers came in the 1980s, when the United States supported Iraq in its war against Iran. They were detailed in a 1994 Senate Banking Committee report and a 1995 follow-up letter from the CDC to the Senate.
The exports were legal at the time and approved under a program administered by the Commerce Department.
"I don't think it would be accurate to say the United States government deliberately provided seed stocks to the Iraqis' biological weapons programs," said Jonathan Tucker, a former U.N. biological weapons inspector.
"But they did deliver samples that Iraq said had a legitimate public health purpose, which I think was naive to believe, even at the time."
The disclosures put the United States in the uncomfortable position of possibly having provided the key ingredients of the weapons America is considering waging war to destroy, said Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va. Byrd entered the documents into the Congressional Record this month.
Byrd asked Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld about the germ transfers at a recent Senate Armed Services Committee hearing. Byrd noted that Rumsfeld met Saddam in 1983, when Rumsfeld was President Reagan's Middle East envoy.
"Are we, in fact, now facing the possibility of reaping what we have sown?" Byrd asked Rumsfeld after reading parts of a Newsweek article on the transfers.
"I have never heard anything like what you've read, I have no knowledge of it whatsoever, and I doubt it," Rumsfeld said. He later said he would ask the Defense Department and other government agencies to search their records for evidence of the transfers.
Invoices included in the documents read like shopping lists for biological weapons programs. One 1986 shipment from the Virginia-based American Type Culture Collection included three strains of anthrax, six strains of the bacteria that make botulinum toxin and three strains of the bacteria that cause gas gangrene. Iraq later admitted to the United Nations that it had made weapons out of all three.
The company sent the bacteria to the University of Baghdad, which U.N. inspectors concluded had been used as a front to acquire samples for Iraq's biological weapons program.
The CDC, meanwhile, sent shipments of germs to the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission and other agencies involved in Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs. It sent samples in 1986 of botulinum toxin and botulinum toxoid – used to make vaccines against botulinum toxin – directly to the Iraqi chemical and biological weapons complex at al-Muthanna, the records show.
Botulinum toxin is the paralyzing poison that causes botulism. Having a vaccine to the toxin would be useful for anyone working with it, such as biological weapons researchers or soldiers who might be exposed to the deadly poison, Tucker said.
The CDC also sent samsamples of a strain of West Nile virus to an Iraqi microbiologist at a university in the southern city of Basra in 1985, the records show.
The documents are available at: http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2002_cr/s092002.html
Cheney applied 'constant' pressure to stall investigation on flawed Iraq intelligence
By Jonathan S. Landay
McClatchy Newspapers
Chuck Kennedy/MCT
Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-WV, chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, speaks to reporters.
Cheney increasingly on the defensive
Durbin calls Cheney 'delusional'
WASHINGTON - Vice President Dick Cheney exerted "constant" pressure on the Republican former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee to stall an investigation into the Bush administration's use of flawed intelligence on Iraq, the panel's Democratic chairman charged Thursday.
In an interview with McClatchy Newspapers, Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia also accused President Bush of running an illegal program by ordering eavesdropping on Americans' international e-mails and telephone communications without court-issued warrants.
In the 45-minute interview, Rockefeller said that it was "not hearsay" that Cheney, a leading proponent of invading Iraq, pushed Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., to drag out the probe of the administration's use of prewar intelligence.
"It was just constant," Rockefeller said of Cheney's alleged interference. He added that he knew that the vice president attended regular policy meetings in which he conveyed White House directions to Republican staffers.
Republicans "just had to go along with the administration," he said.
In an e-mail response to Rockefeller's comments, Cheney's spokeswoman, Lea McBride, said: "The vice president believes Senator Roberts was a good chairman of the Intelligence Committee."
Roberts' chief of staff, Jackie Cottrell, blamed the Democrats for the investigation remaining incomplete more than two years after it began.
"Senator Rockefeller's allegations are patently untrue," she said in an e-mail statement. "The delays came from the Democrats' insistence that they expand the scope of the inquiry to make it a more political document going into the 2006 elections. Chairman Roberts did everything he could to accommodate their requests for further information without allowing them to distort the facts."
"I'm not aware of any effort by the vice president, his staff or anyone in the administration to influence the speed at which the committee did its work," said Bill Duhnke, who was Roberts' staff director.
Rockefeller's comments were among the most forceful he's made about why the committee failed to complete the inquiry under Roberts. Roberts chaired the intelligence committee from January 2003 until the Democrats took over Congress this month.
The panel released a report in July 2004 that lambasted the CIA and other U.S. intelligence agencies for erroneously concluding that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was concealing biological, chemical and nuclear warfare programs. It then began examining how senior Bush administration officials used faulty intelligence to justify the March 2003 invasion.
Robert promised to quickly complete what became known as the Phase II investigation. After more than two years, however, the panel published only two of five Phase II reports amid serious rifts between Republican and Democratic members and their staffs.
Rockefeller recalled that in November 2005, the then-minority Democrats employed a rarely used parliamentary procedure to force the Senate into a closed session to pressure Roberts to complete Phase II.
"That was the reason we closed the session. To force him" to complete the investigation, he said.
The most potentially controversial of the three Phase II reports being worked on will compare what Bush and his top lieutenants said publicly about Iraq's weapons programs and ties to terrorists with what was contained in top-secret intelligence reports.
In the two reports released in September, the panel said that the administration's claims of ties between Saddam and al-Qaida were false and found that administration officials distributed exaggerated and bogus claims provided by an Iraqi exile group with close ties to some senior administration officials.
Rockefeller said it was important to complete the Phase II inquiry.
"The looking backward creates tension, but it's necessary tension because the administration needs to be held accountable and the country . . . needs to know," he said.
Rockefeller said that he and the senior Republican member of the committee, Sen. Christopher Bond, R-Mo., have put the frictions behind them and agree that the committee should press the administration for documents it's withholding on its domestic eavesdropping program and detainee programs.
Under the eavesdropping program, the National Security Agency monitored Americans' international telephone calls and e-mails without court warrants if one party was a suspected member or supporter of al-Qaida or another terrorist group.
Rockefeller charged that Bush had violated the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which requires the government to obtain permission to eavesdrop on Americans from a secret national security court.
"For five years he's (Bush) has been operating an illegal program," he said, adding that the committee wants the administration to provide the classified documents that set out its legal argument that Bush has the power to wiretap Americans without warrants.
Rockefeller is among a handful of lawmakers who were kept briefed on the program after it started following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. But he told Cheney in a handwritten note in July 2003 that he was deeply concerned about its legality.
In the interview, Rockefeller said the committee needs more details about how the program worked before it considers amending the eavesdropping act to give the administration the flexibility it says it requires to be able to track terrorists.
"How do we draw something up if we have no idea about what the president sent out in the way of orders to the NSA? What about the interpretation of the Department of Justice?" he asked. "Americans . . . should want us to discern what the facts are, what the truth is."
The top American envoy to Venezuela William Brownfield works for the corporations that operate in venezuala, He does not work for the Citizens of The United States, we must not pay him as much as the corporations.....
Venezuela may ask U.S. envoy to leave By CHRISTOPHER TOOTHAKER, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 10 minutes ago
CARACAS, Venezuela - President Hugo Chavez warned Thursday that the U.S. ambassador could be asked to leave the country if he continues "meddling in Venezuela's affairs."
The outspoken Venezuelan leader lashed out after William Brownfield said U.S. companies and investors must receive a fair price for their shares of Venezuela's largest telephone company when Chavez's government nationalizes it.
"If you continue meddling in Venezuela's affairs, first of all, you are violating the Geneva agreements and getting yourself involved in a serious violation and could ... be declared a persona non grata and would have to leave the country," Chavez.
The top American envoy to Venezuela told Caracas' Union Radio the planned takeover of CA Nacional de Telefonos, or CANTV, should proceed "in a transparent, legal manner" and that Venezuela's government must offer "fair and quick compensation to the people who are affected or the owners."
"These are the only obligations that a government has when it decides to nationalize an industry," Brownfield added.
Thursday's exchange is the latest demonstration of tensions between Caracas and Washington.
U.S. officials have accused Chavez of becoming increasingly authoritarian and of being a destabilizing force in Latin America. The Venezuelan leader has repeatedly accused Washington of scheming against his left-leaning government.
Virginia-based Verizon Communications Inc. holds the largest minority share of CANTV, which was privatized in 1991. The takeover jeopardizes an agreement by Verizon to sell its 28.5 percent stake in CANTV to a joint venture of America Movil and Telefonos de Mexico SA, controlled by Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim.
The sale had been awaiting Venezuelan government regulatory approval.
Chavez, a self-proclaimed "revolutionary" who is steering Venezuela toward socialism, has said he wants an immediate state takeover of the telephone company and will not pay shareholders the market value. The Venezuelan leader has said the price for CANTV would take into account debts to workers, pensions and other obligations to the state.
Brownfield said he was optimistic that shareholders would be fairly compensated.
"I think it can be a process that concludes in a satisfactory manner for all those involved, that's my hope," he said.
Chavez _ a close ally of Cuban leader Fidel Castro _ also has said he plans to nationalize the electricity sector, and take state control of four lucrative oil projects and the natural gas sector.
Relations between Caracas and Washington have been tense since Chavez was briefly ousted in a 2002 coup that he claimed the U.S. played a role in. The Bush administration has repeatedly denied involvement, although it recognized an interim government established by coup leaders.
Brownfield said he wanted to improve relations through "a serious and pragmatic dialogue between the two governments, to identify issues of mutual interest and to look for solutions to those issues."
(Verizon bought all the pay phones in King county near seattle and now charges 3 dollers per minute for a phone call...)
I used to go to globalsecurity.com , they had all the public records of the transactions with saddam in the 80s and some chilling cia comunications about the effect of the poison gass on the Iranian soldiers, but the site was bought or somehow lost most of the info, and hundreds of articles of worldly viewpoints that just vanished. I used to read the emperor allot also but havent for a year or so its hard to keep up with it all,... I was always a right winger bush and his dad turned me into an independant... Feels good!!
Democrats will show their true colors, and approve this new war money, I guarantee it...
Bush asks congress for ten billion for Afganistan, $8.6 billion would be for training and equipping Afghan police and security forces, and $2 billion would be for reconstruction. The money would be spent over the next two years.
Earlier Thursday, that White House said Bush would ask for more than $8 billion.
Maby they need another election...
This country has been run by the labor party for 70 years, And all labor has been hurt by wastefull social programs run by the country club millionair democrats, Howard zin can show the facist tendancies of the right wing but he never points out the huge problem of labors failure in america with 70 years of friendly government and judges.
REpost Bushladen Carlyle Group:
George Soros & James Baker are part of the Family
[Emperor's Clothes note: The following is an excerpt from a 'Baltimore Chronicle & Sentinel' article entitled, "Republican-controlled Carlyle Group poses serious Ethical Questions for Bush Presidents, but Baltimore Sun ignores it.'
The article, written by Alice Cherbonnier, deals with the world's largest private equity firm, The Carlyle Group, a company that links George Bush Sr. and the family of Osama bin Laden. ]
[START of EXCERPT]
Copyright © 2001 'The Baltimore Chronicle and the SENTINEL'
"AN IMPORTANT TENET of journalism is that you should always ask, 'Who benefits?'
"In the case of a war, the answers to this question become of paramount importance. Suppose, for example, that profits from military contracting were to go in the pockets of a former U.S. President whose son (and a presumed future heir) is now President? Suppose further that such profits escalate in times of conflict. Wouldn’t this be of concern to the public? Wouldn’t you expect the media to be all over such an important ethical (not to mention moral, and maybe legal) angle?
"Though described by the Industry Standard as 'the world’s largest private equity firm,' with over $12 billion under management, chances are readers haven’t ever heard of The Carlyle Group. Isn’t that a little odd, considering it is run by a veritable who's who of former Republican political leaders. Former Defense Secretary Frank Carlucci is Carlyle’s chairman and managing director (who, by the way, was college roommate of the current Defense Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld). And that partners in this mammoth venture include former U.S. Secretary of State James A. Baker III, George Soros, Fred Malek (George H.W. Bush’s campaign manager, forced to resign when it was revealed he was Nixon’s 'Jew counter'), and 'presumably' George H.W. Bush?
"We say 'presumably' because the privately-held Carlyle doesn’t have to reveal information about its partners or investments to the SEC or to anyone else. Our former President is reported to be active in seeking investments for the Carlyle Group from the Asian market, and word is he’s paid between $80,000 to $100,000 per presentation.
"All told, Carlyle has about 420 partners all over the globe, from Saudi princes to the former president of the Philippines. Its investments run heavily in the defense sector; they make money from military conflicts and weapons spending."
[END of EXCERPT]
excerpt from http://baltimorechronicle.com/media3_oct01.shtml
3 October 2001, 'Baltimore Chronicle & Sentinel' article by Alice Cherbonnier
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Further Reading
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'Bushladen': the first article in the series about Bush and bin Laden family partnership in the Carlyle Group 'defense' business at:
http://emperors-clothes.com/news/bushladen.htm
'Why
Bush has grown some balls recently or has been frightened or presured into submision. The recent crackdown is good, less civilians will die. The Crackdown should be supported. number of troops is not as important as the will to accomplish some form of peace. If they can not form a fair government then all is lost, civil war until one wins or the neighbors join in and realy fuck up the whole world... We have to help give Ideas to our leadership. on how to build a country in fair terms that will keep all the people free, this " vote in your shite majority" , and all oil is controled by bush n co and given to the Iraqi govern ment with strings is horse shit,, we must get to the bottom of what is happening to the oil... It is being stolen by Bush n co Soudi Arabia and the Iraqis are getting screwed,, this is why they will fight in the streets, bush n co have fucked it up.Iraq oil production is at peak levels they will say that it is not, but it is... The oil is being stolen also by the Iraqi government oficials that take control of what the Americans give them ,, they sell it out the back door at top dollar and the Iraqi people cant even buy a gallon of gass at the pump ... They have six hours of electricity. no garbage service no jobs no clean water no sewer service... Wow the more I write the more I think We should find new leaders,,, Democrats lame idiots who most voted for this war. can make there bs nonbinding votes and shove them up there ass, they have nothing to offer they need to go back to there county clubs and suck dick or whatever they do for fun...Republicans Brainwashed Nazis Need to go home take there american flags and shove them up there asses.
Any atempt to kill Osama bin laden was Jeered as an atempt to distract from the Monica lewinsky story , The Right wing didnt support the troops who fired those cruise misslers at him, the right wing called them monicas missles, nice support, way to keep your eye on the ball. cant see beyond your own nose.
The American soldier guards our freedom, or protects our freedom. This is the bigest lie of all. The Constitution protects our freedom. Germany Lost ww2 and they are free the Soviets won ww2 and were not free for 60 years.
Black hawk huh? Down? What?So why were the marines in somalia to get cut to ribons by the locals who hate them or to help the locals who hate them? I just dont get it, I must be stupid...
So why was The USS Cole in a Yemen Port? to help those sand nigers that you hate? Thats strange ,
Taliban captured Osama Bin Laden and offered to turn him over to pakistan for trial. Bush said no . and started bombing the Taliban then Osama was set free. Dont forget that,, the history books are being writen incorectly to leave that huge detail out. This all was avoidable but it was the Facist Bush n co that wanted to drop million dollar cruise missles on clay huts. Taliban gathered 500 tribal leaders to discuss what to do with Osama ,, they all agreed to turn him over to Pakistan for trial... So the entire Afgan and Iraq wars are over extradision disagrement over a criminal,, not a good way to handle it, 500,000 dead people later.. and still preaching sanctity of life on a fetal cells for research. can we use dead Iraqi shoppers cells for research,, or the 70 college students that got blown up last week in bagdad, hmmm they would be some good fresh cells...
Ohh yeah then the us military had the tribal leaders help round up the taliban,,, the us military was handing out money to the tribal leaders for loyalty. Cant buy love I guess.