I Should Address

...the scarcity of posts these last couple of weeks. The wireless issue pretty much shuts the TP down after 5:00 CST, and the hours before that are bought and paid for by an independent entity (read: I'm at my day job). Until such time as we can get the network issues resolved, I'll be in and out as time permits, but nearly at the level we'd been planning. Combine that with the rushing torrent of news these past few weeks, the prospect of delayed posting doesn't work well for my tastes.

We're working on it. Any suggestions would be more than welcome.

A Moment of Reflection

Big day in history today. A day of consequences for the actions of the man who coined the term fascism. The Guardian UK reprints an Op-Ed from 1945.
Emphasis my own.

April 28 1945: On this day Italian partisans executed Mussolini and his mistress.

Rough Justice

Comment
Monday April 30, 1945
The Guardian

If, as seems likely, Mussolini and other prominent members of the Fascist hierarchy have been shot by the Italian partisans without trial or argument, no one in the Allied countries will complain. These men were as guilty as any. They were sufficiently notorious to make identification easy. They richly deserved their fate. The method cannot be taken as a precedent, but many will feel that there is a certain rough justice about these swift and passionate executions which may be lacking from the cold-blooded judicial trials of which we shall have all too many before we are finished. Of the dead men only one has earned a place in history. Mussolini, the inventor of Fascism and the first modern dictator, was a man of no ordinary ability. This rough, shrewd, ambitious peasant was the first to discover the modern road to power. Long before Hitler he found an army among the down-and-outs, the unemployed, the ex-Service men, the whole tribe of "armed Bohemians" left over from the first world war. And long before Hitler he realised the power of propaganda as an instrument to support his rule. For this last he was exceptionally suited. A journalist, he had himself a flamboyant, effective style both in writing and speaking, which, unfortunately, he has bequeathed to the Italy that has got rid of him. A true Italian, he perfectly understood the dramatic gesture which so appeals to a nation with an operatic tradition.

In one respect Mussolini was always easier understand than Hitler. He was no fanatic, but a cynic who in private would often talk in a reasonable and intelligent manner. His foreign policy, therefore, was more predictable. In the early days at least he had no love for Hitler or for Germany, which he rightly regarded as the supreme threat to Italian independence. But when his absurd dreams of empire had led him into the Abyssinian adventure he was forced into the arms of Germany. The half-hearted policy of "sanctions" did not save Abyssinia but only made the Axis certain. Like the leaders of the democracies Mussolini underrated Hitler, whom he naturally despised as an intellectual inferior who had copied his example. At the same time he overrated the power of Italy and the loyalty of Italians to the Fascist Government. It is now clear that, for all their criminal folly, the Italian people never wholly accepted the denial of liberty, the cruelty and corruption, which went with Fascism. Many, too many unfortunately, liked to be told that Italy was a great and martial nation, but when it came to the point they were at once too sensible and too civilised to follow their leader to the end. If Italian fascism was less horrible than German Nazism, one must thank the Italian people and not Mussolini. As it is, his crimes were sufficient. The Murder of Matteotti and the invasion of Spain, to name only two, are not easily forgotten. But Mussolini's greatest crime was to have been the inventor and creator of that evil disease which has so nearly brought Europe to ruin. He was the first Fascist, and as such will stand infamous in history.

Hmmmmm

It's always interesting to hear from folks on the ground in Iraq, regardless of why they're there. Interesting, too, to see the actions of those who can leave or stay according to their own decisions:

Three Alabama businessmen have decided to leave Baghdad for a while because they've received word that militias loyal to a controversial Muslim cleric will try to take over the Iraqi capital on Thursday.

"Things are getting hot in Baghdad!" Winton Blount IV wrote in a Sunday e-mail from Amman, Jordan. Blount and his partners, Andy Furr and Danny Campbell, flew to Amman on Saturday after having basically remained in their apartment for 12 consecutive days to stay out of harm's way....

...While the Alabamians waited for tensions to subside, Blount said, American, British and Iraqi sources told them that "Baghdad will ignite" on Thursday and that "all shops MUST close and militia will try to take over." Then they saw a senior American military commander, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, say in a televised press conference that U.S. forces would be waiting for al-Sadr's militia if they made a move on Baghdad.

"This just supported our decision to hit the road for a while," Blount wrote.

Blount has been in Iraq since mid-July. His company, Blount 4 Iraq Construction, has been building or renovating military barracks or other facilities for U.S. troops in the country. At times, the company has employed several hundred Iraqis.

During the recent period in which he, Campbell and Furr were keeping a low profile, their company signed nine small contracts, Blount said.

Early on the morning of April 13, they inked three of those contracts after driving at breakneck speeds to an office at Baghdad International Airport. After arriving, they were told that on the day before, there had been 10 ambushes along part of their route to the airport, a stretch of road which they had driven at speeds that reached 100 mph.

"It was very unnerving," said Blount, who added that he, Furr and Campbell were armed for the brief journey. "I actually had the safety OFF on my MP5 machine gun for the 15-minute trip."

On Saturday at the airport, before they flew to Jordan, the three partners learned that the military had five new contracts for them.

"This made us realize that we can do better by staying out of the way and letting our organization run things when it is safe," Blount said.

How We Judge Success

Given that whenever there's an acceleration of Americans (or Iraqis) dying violent deaths CENTCOM and the Bush administration see it as a mark of success (the better we're doing, the more we're hated, fired upon, resented, and killed), there should be corks a'poppin in Dohar and DC.

Mubarak: Arabs Hate U.S. More Than Ever

Mubarak, who visited the United States last week, told French newspaper Le Monde that Washington's actions had caused despair, frustration and a sense of injustice in the Arab world.

"Today there is hatred of the Americans like never before in the region," he said in an interview given during a stay in France, where he met President Jacques Chirac Monday.

He blamed the hostility partly on U.S. support for Israel, which assassinated Hamas leader Abdel-Aziz al-Rantissi in a missile strike in the Gaza Strip (news - web sites) Saturday weeks after killing his predecessor, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.

"At the start some considered the Americans were helping them. There was no hatred of the Americans. After what has happened in Iraq, there is unprecedented hatred and the Americans know it," Mubarak said.

Sleight of Hand

While everyone is (understandably) up in arms over the Saudi royals playing the game of American politics, using their control over oil prices to dictate hopeful electoral outcomes, there is a much bigger and (again) impeachable offense here, and one that cannot be brushed aside as easily. We now know from Woodward's book that Gen. Tommy Franks was given a blank check with which to begin setting the stage for the Iraq war the president said he wasn't planning for. Of course, this was before the serious misinformation push began, before the spectre of mushroom clouds were pushed on the public by the administration, and therefore appropriating open-ended support for an Iraq-directed military build-up would have been a hard nut to get congress to swallow. Soution: act as though Bush's wistful longing for the ease of a Bush dictatorship was not (another) mis-statement by the president, but an executive order.

From CBS:

Woodward reports that just five days after Sept. 11, President Bush indicated to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice that while he had to do Afghanistan first, he was also determined to do something about Saddam Hussein.

”There's some pressure to go after Saddam Hussein. Don Rumsfeld has said, ‘This is an opportunity to take out Saddam Hussein, perhaps. We should consider it.’ And the president says to Condi Rice meeting head to head, ‘We won't do Iraq now.’ But it is a question we're gonna have to return to,’” says Woodward.

“And there's this low boil on Iraq until the day before Thanksgiving, Nov. 21, 2001. This is 72 days after 9/11. This is part of this secret history. President Bush, after a National Security Council meeting, takes Don Rumsfeld aside, collars him physically, and takes him into a little cubbyhole room and closes the door and says, ‘What have you got in terms of plans for Iraq? What is the status of the war plan? I want you to get on it. I want you to keep it secret.’"

Woodward says immediately after that, Rumsfeld told Gen. Tommy Franks to develop a war plan to invade Iraq and remove Saddam - and that Rumsfeld gave Franks a blank check.

”Rumsfeld and Franks work out a deal essentially where Franks can spend any money he needs. And so he starts building runways and pipelines and doing all the preparations in Kuwait, specifically to make war possible,” says Woodward.

“Gets to a point where in July, the end of July 2002, they need $700 million, a large amount of money for all these tasks. And the president approves it. But Congress doesn't know and it is done. They get the money from a supplemental appropriation for the Afghan War, which Congress has approved. …Some people are gonna look at a document called the Constitution which says that no money will be drawn from the Treasury unless appropriated by Congress. Congress was totally in the dark on this."

How much will it take?

Prince of Thieves

I've yet to read the book, but from the excerpts in the Washington Post and points discussed in the major media, the most damning information in Bob Woodward's new book has to be the "Bandar revelation." For those who haven't heard, Prince Bandar of Saudi Arabia has promised the Bush administration that OPEC will increase crude oil production and lower prices before the November elections to ensure a solid economic boost for Bush to run on..

First, there's the obvious question of, if Bandar can raise or lower crude prices as he sees fit, what's stopping him from doing so now, when Americans are paying historically high (though internationally still very low) gasoline prices. You'd expect no less from such a close Bush family friend that that the president's mother has nicknamed him Bandar Bush, a man with such a high standing in the Bush administration that he was briefed on the Iraq war plan before even the president's own Secretary of State.

But then of course we must ask why crude prices are suddenly so high to begin with. A vague, "because of the war" makes no sense. We've been in Iraq for a year. Why now? What's the driving factor behind the inflated prices Americans are paying at the pump? We know that American oil companies are processing less of the crude they have on hand, which is in turn driving prices up just as surely as OPEC's decreasing output, but it is the compounded effect of the two that have prices reaching the heights they are. That, though, is not at issue. Why has an organization, OPEC, headed by Prince Bandar, close Bush family friend and trusted ally, chosen to cut back on production now? If logic counts for anything, he must have had a hand in the price spike as well.

Given that Bandar enjoys such privileged access to the Oval Office and the Crawford ranch as well, given that he is briefed on war plans clearly marked as classified against any foreign eyes, that he would allow oil prices to rise to current levels implies one of two things. Either he is indifferent to the political "heat" on Bush, which is unimaginable, or this spike was, as was the planned pre-election drop, decided upon in advance. Under cover of an OPEC decision to cut back production, American companies cut back operations at their refineries too, increasing not only Arabian but American profits as well. Everybody wins. Everybody, that is, except the independent gas station proprietor and the American consumer.

The biggest question raised by all this is why, and how, on earth an Arab monarch can play such a participatory role in American politics. Forget the hundreds of millions of dollars funneled to Bush family and friends by the Saudi Royals. Forget the Saudi nationals collected from all around the country in the days following September 11th, flown to the safety of their homeland and free from questioning by American authorities. Forget about the fact that the Saudi government is paying top dollar for Bush familiar James Baker's law firm to defend themselves in a civil suit brought by the families of 9/11 victims. Forget even the oil connection that binds the families Bush and Saud together at the hip.

The Bush administration owes the American public a detailed and honest accounting of what exactly gives an Arabian monarch the right to decide an American election. The price-fixing amounts to nothing less than Prince Bandar, and by proxy the Saudi government, attempting to influence who should be in power in the United States, a decision traditionally left to the American voter. That 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi citizens should not be lost on us either. After the furor raised over John Kerry suggesting that there were many "foreign leaders" who would like to see him prevail in November, the Bush campaign, if not the administration (devoid as they are of responsibility--for anything), should explain how a tyrannical and oil-rich kingdom's meddling in the electoral integrity of America can be any better at all.

These questions, like so many others before and undoubtedly still to come will most likely go unanswered by the president, but that shouldn't stop Americans from asking them. If the Bush administration is ever to understand that accountability does indeed extend to their own actions, it will only come by the American public calling loudly for answers. Though he did, unfortunately, once publicly long for an American dictatorship (it would be a lot easier, he said) Bush should realize that he is not, unlike his friends in the Saudi royal family, a brutal despot past the reach of both law and public opinion. Not yet, in any event.

Piece on BuzzFlash

I have a new column running on BuzzFlash as of this morning. Yesterday Sen. Pat Roberts firmly and flatly rebuffed his Republican colleague Bill Frist's accusations of perjury against Richard Clarke. It is time to bring this very visible example of the seek & destroy tactics employed by the GOP up into the public discourse. Frist's behavior demands some sort of censure; in the editorial I call for his resignation.

A special invitation to those of you coming by for the first time, linking off of BuzzFlash: please take some time and have a look at some of my other Op-Ed pieces.

Oh the Humanity

While it's still unclear whether this is a personal strength or weakness, I am a firm believer in individual humanity. I believe each and every one of us has moments of inescapable humanity, times when the mirror is held up before us and we must confront the truth of who we are. We all have honest hopes and dreams, loves and fears. We all hurt deeply at one time or another, and we hurt others as well. There are times when every human being breaks down to cry.

We live in a world and time where it is painfully easy to doubt the humanity of our fellow men. The airwaves are filthy with images of people acting anything but humanely to one another. The horror and atrocity we can inflict on others never fails to shock, even though we have literally the entirety of human history pointing to just that very truth. Generally, however, when we act our most inhuman, our most vicious, we're acting in groups, thinking group think, doing group deeds.

On an individual level though, we're all but variations on a single theme, and I've always believed we all face, too, the occasional dark night of the soul. These are the mirror moments I speak of, when we're forced to confront the truth of ourselves, the motivations behind our deeds, and the consequences of our actions in this life. I've always trusted in my fellow man's ability to feel deeply, to be human, and therefore to be able to return, even from the edge of the abyss.

Which is why, when I let my mind go down that road, I have such a hard time coming to grips with George Bush and his administration. I wonder often what it is that prevents them from seeing the larger implications of their actions. Surely they understand the numbers in their reports and studies correlate to actual, living, breathing, human beings. Surely it can't all be about money and power and nothing else. Surely there's more.

For a time, especially when it came to their disastrous foreign policy initiatives in Iraq and the wider Middle East, I kept coming up against the same brick wall: they simply have to believe they're doing the right thing, I told myself. I had to. It made no sense at all otherwise. There's no way a human being, blessed with a God-given soul and capacity for compassion, could continue to plow through the world, razing everything in his path if there were indeed these moments of true self-reflection. Is there?

As the misinformation used to justify the war becomes more readily apparent, though, and as more and more light is shed on the way this administration does, and has done business, the less I'm able to entertain this theory. The party line may well be that, deep in their souls, the President and his hawkish fellows know, without a doubt, that by "establishing a free and democratic Iraq" they will reshape the Middle East itself, and democracy will spread like kudzu across the region, leading to nothing but peaceful and prosperous tomorrows. But even they don't buy it.

Much was made of the fact that George Bush would be the first American president in history to hold an MBA degree, and as such he would bring a keen business sense to running the affairs of the country. Enron, WorldCom, Tyco and the president's own dodgy past with the SEC notwithstanding, you can be sure the promise has been delivered upon in at least one respect.

They've brought to the Oval Office a critical corporate holdover; the quarterly mind-set. Every move made is geared towards maximum short-term profit, long-term consequences be damned. Concern for the effects of actions on the wider population, foreign or domestic, simply never enters into the calculations, pushed instead to the wayside in deference to the shareholder expecting quarterly earnings. For this administration, aside from Bush's base of support, the polls are their shareholders. Not the human beings behind those numbers, mind you; just the numbers themselves.

Even a cursory examination of the major actions associated with this presidency shows each inextricably linked to a political goal. Whatever must be said or done to accomplish an aim has been said and done. The fact that this administration hijacked the events of September 11th, 2001 to move ahead with a preplanned invasion and occupation of Iraq is only the most glaring example of a similar story which has played itself out again and again since Bush was installed into office by Supreme Court decision. So much for their vaunted disdain for the Judicial branch deciding matters of national debate.

Surely though, there are some nights when these men, and women, must wake suddenly in the deep of night, sweating and painfully aware. Surely they have moments when, say, confronted by images of the professional soldiers' mutilated corpses hanging from a bridge over the Euphrates, or the frightened faces of an ever growing collection of civilian hostages, or, though they would deny them, the images of dead and wounded Iraqi civilians, they have to question whether or not the actions they've taken, and the motivation behind those actions, have been worth the cost. Surely they must. They're human after all. Even if they feel themselves unaccountable by the electorate, press, or congress, surely they realize accountability transcends all of that and they will, someday, have to answer for their deeds..

Distilled Whimsy

From The Gadflyer, which is quickly becoming a favorite read of mine:

Bush's Presser: The Reader's Digest Version

Q: Sir, is Iraq becoming a Vietnam-style quagmire?
A: No.

Q: How long will US troops be in Iraq and how many more will be sent there?
A: As long and as many as I want.

Q: Sir, you and other administration officials said we’d be greeted as liberators by Iraqis, that oil revenue would pay for the reconstruction efforts, and that not only did Saddam have weapons of mass destruction but we knew exactly where they were. These were all wrong. Wasn’t this entire war built on a series of false premises?
A: No.

Q: Sir, you admitted to Bob Woodward that before 9/11 you didn’t feel a sense of urgency about Osama bin Laden. Do you feel any responsibility for the attacks?
A: No.

Q: Sir, whether it’s WMD, post-war planning in Iraq, or 9/11 you are never willing to admit a mistake. Were there any errors in judgment you made in any of these three areas?
A: No.

Q: Sir, you like to say that the August 6, 2001 intelligence briefing didn’t say al Qaeda was planning to fly planes into the World Trade Center at 8:48 a.m. on a sunny morning on September 11th as Mabel Johnson sat down to have a bagel at her house in Des Moines and a butterfly flapped its wings in Singapore, and therefore there was nothing “threatening” about the memo and no need for you to take action. But it did mention the likelihood of hijackings. Did the memo trigger you to take any action whatsoever to prevent even this kind of attack?
A: No.

Q: Sire, I’m from Fox News Channel. Isn’t 9/11 really all the FBI’s fault and you’re above reproach?
A: Yes.

Q: Sir, will you apologize to the families of the 9/11 victims?

A: Hell no.

Q: Sir, after the Americans and the British, the group with the most “guns on the ground” in Iraq are private security contractors, not other coalition countries. Do you have any plans on making this a true international coalition rather than a token one?
A: No.

Q: Sir, why are you insisting on testifying before the 9/11 commission with Vice President Cheney rather than by yourself as they requested?
A: I’m appearing because they asked.
Q: Sir, that wasn’t my question. My question was why do you need Cheney there to hold your hand?
A: Next.

Q: Sire, I’m from the Washington Times. Don’t you think your critics are hypocrites for accusing you of not acting preemptively before 9/11 but then attacking you for doing so in Iraq?
A: Yes.

Q: Sir, Americans don’t think you’re doing a very good job handling the crisis in Iraq and question your reasons for going there. This may cost you your job in November. Shouldn’t you maybe listen to their concerns?
A: No.

Q: Sir, what is the biggest mistake you’ve made as president and what lesson did you learn from it.
A [ACTUAL ANSWER]: Hmmm. I wish you'd have given me this written question ahead of time so I could plan for it. I'm sure historians will look back and say, Gosh, he could have done it better this way or that way. You know, I just ...

[LONG SILENCE]

[Crickets chirp.]

[Tumbleweed blows by.]

...I'm sure something will pop into my head here in the midst of this press conference with all the pressure of trying to come up with an answer, but it hadn't yet. You know, I hope I don't want to sound like I've made no mistakes. I'm confident I have. I just haven't — you just put me under the spot here and maybe I'm not quick, as quick on my feet as I should be in coming up with one.

Q: Sir, you mentioned yesterday that you’d be interested in reforming the intelligence community. But that takes presidential leadership. Do you plan on providing any?
A: No.

Q: Sir, you avoid press conferences like the plague. Are you a poor communicator and have you failed to make your case to the American people?
A: No. And when I say something I mean it.

After all, the credibility of the United States is at stake.

Harr harr! It's funny 'cause it's true! D'oh!

Must-calls and Memes

More from last night's "media availability" by the president:

Q. Mr. President, Why are you and the vice president insisting on appearing together before the 9/11 commission? And Mr. President, who will you be handing the Iraqi government over to on June 30?

A. We'll find that out soon. That's what Mr. Brahimi is doing. He's figuring out the nature of the entity we'll be handing sovereignty over. And secondly, because the the 9/11 commission wants to ask us questions. That's why we're meeting, and I look forward to meeting with them and answering their questions.

Q. Mr. President, I was asking why you're appearing together rather than separately, which was their request.

A. Because it's a good chance for both of us to answer questions that the 9/11 commission is looking forward to asking us, and I'm looking forward to answering them.

Let's see. Hold on for a minute. Oh — I've got some must calls, I'm sorry.

Q. You have been accused of letting the 9/11 threat mature too far, but not letting the Iraq threat mature far enough. First, could you respond to that general criticism? And secondly, in the wake of these two conflicts, what is the appropriate threat level to justify action in, perhaps, other situations going forward?

A. Yeah. I guess there have been some that said, well, we should have taken pre-emptive action in Afghanistan, and then turned around and said we shouldn't have taken pre-emptive action in Iraq. And my answer to that question is that — again, I repeat what I said earlier — prior to 9/11, the country really wasn't on a war footing. And the, frankly, mood of the world would have been astounded had the United States acted unilaterally in trying to deal with Al Qaeda in that part of the world. It would have been awfully hard to do, as well, by the way. We would have had — we hadn't got our relationship right with Pakistan yet. The caucus area would have been very difficult from which to base. It just seemed an impractical strategy at the time. And frankly, I didn't contemplate it. I did contemplate a larger strategy as to how to deal with Al Qaeda. We — you know, we were shooting cruise missiles and with little effect. And I said, if we're going to go after Al Qaeda, let's have a comprehensive strategy as to how to deal with it, with that entity.

Now, today it's been widely discussed that this second questioner was Washington Times/FOX "reporter" Bill Sammon. Later on that evening on CNN's Larry King Live, Mitch McConnell chimed in:

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R), KY, MAJORITY WHIP: Well, I think he laid out a good case, Larry, for doing what we've done since 9/11, which is to try to drain the swamp. I mean the president is being criticized by some for not acting soon enough prior to 9/11 and then for acting too soon in Iraq.

You see what's going on here, don't you? As always, the GOP and their reps in congress and the media (Sean Hannity was on the Today Show this morning with more of the same) will pepper the airwaves with this meme; that we had to go in to Iraq, when and how we did and not a moment later, because we waited too long to go in to Afghanistan to take out the Taliban and al Qaeda. The same technique sees many mentions (almost verbatim) of how the 9/11 commission is already showing it's partisan stripes, and therefore whatever the report, it will be tainted. Truth never enters into the equation for this team. So, anyway, we will see this meme pop up again and again in the days to follow. It must; the talking points memo was distributed to everyone, including Sammon and McConnell, Hannity and Limbaugh. Watch.

Lies, and the Lying Liars

Dana Priest of the Washington Post continues to inspire as well. From today's WaPo, revelations that the infamous August 6 PDB was just the last in a long list of briefings given the President by the CIA:

Panel Says Bush Saw Repeated Warnings
Reports Preceded August 2001 Memo

By Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 14, 2004; Page A01

By the time a CIA briefer gave President Bush the Aug. 6, 2001, President's Daily Brief headlined "Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US," the president had seen a stream of alarming reports on al Qaeda's intentions. So had Vice President Cheney and Bush's top national security team, according to newly declassified information released yesterday by the commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

In April and May 2001, for example, the intelligence community headlined some of those reports "Bin Laden planning multiple operations," "Bin Laden network's plans advancing" and "Bin Laden threats are real."

The intelligence included reports of a hostage plot against Americans. It noted that operatives might choose to hijack an aircraft or storm a U.S. embassy. Without knowing when, where or how the terrorists would strike, the CIA "consistently described the upcoming attacks as occurring on a catastrophic level, indicating that they would cause the world to be in turmoil," according to one of two staff reports released by the panel yesterday.

"Reports similar to these were made available to President Bush in the morning meetings with [Director of Central Intelligence George J.] Tenet," the commission staff said.

The information offers the most detailed account to date of the warnings the intelligence community gave top Bush administration officials, and it provides the context in which a CIA briefer put together a memo on Osama bin Laden's activities in the Aug. 6 brief for Bush

Just For the Record

Though I was put off guard and lulled into a hypnotic trance by the carefully chosen necktie Bush was wearing last night as he held his third primetime news conference since taking office (only his twelfth over all), I still saw a man with no grasp of the truth, or at the very least a dogged refusal to acknowledge truth (or answer questions, but that's another story). As I've told clients, many times in the past, "it's not spin when you can see the ball turning."

Q. What's your best prediction on how long U.S. troops will have to be in Iraq. It sounds like you will have to add some troops. Is that a fair assessment?

A. Well, first of all, that's up to General Abizaid. And he's clearly indicating that he may want more troops. It's coming up through the chain of command. And if that's what he wants, that's what he gets.

Generally, we've had about 115,000 troops in Iraq. There's 135,000 now as a result of the changeover from one division to the next. If he wants to keep troops there to help, I'm more than willing to say, Yes, General Abizaid.

I talk to General Abizaid quite frequently. I'm constantly asking him does he have what he needs. Whether it be in troop strength or in equipment. He and General Sanchez talk all the time. And if he makes the recommendation, he'll get it.

Compare, contrast, discuss:

General rebuffs Rumsfeld by pressing for more troops in Iraq

By THOMAS M. DEFRANK
New York Daily News
April 12, 2004

WASHINGTON - War is too important to be left to the generals, a French prime minister famously observed. Now, the generals have decided the Iraq war is too important to be left to the politicians.

Gen. John Abizaid's decision to press for bulking up U.S. firepower is a polite but unmistakable rebuff to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who for months has rejected sending more troops to Iraq in a campaign year.

"What Abizaid is really doing is confronting Rumsfeld," a senior Pentagon official told the New York Daily News. "He's not going to let the election calendar determine what he needs to do the job."

Civilian control of the military is a time-honored American tradition, saluted briskly if not always revered by military brass. As fighting in Iraq exploded last week, killing dozens of G.I.s, Abizaid and his senior commanders were emboldened to press the case for more combat strength, Pentagon sources said.

A senior military official told the Daily News that Abizaid, who speaks fluent Arabic and is regarded as more independent than his predecessor, Gen. Tommy Franks, has been repeatedly discouraged from asking for more soldiers because President Bush has publicly pledged to bring 25,000 troops home from Iraq before the November elections.

"Rumsfeld has made it clear to the whole building that he wasn't interested in getting any requests for more troops," the Pentagon official said.

To placate Rumsfeld, Abizaid has consistently said he has enough "assets" to carry out his assigned mission. Sources close to Abizaid said, however, that for months, he's wanted to expand that mission to seal off Iraq's borders.

Currently, U.S. commanders don't have enough troops to stop the infiltration of foreign fighters into Iraq from Iran, Syria and Saudi Arabia to bolster anti-American insurgents.

In Baghdad last week, a bullish Abizaid said, "We are not headed for disaster as long as we are resolute, courageous and patient." But when asked about needing more troops, he also made clear "everything is on the table," including holding over some units set to rotate home and speeding up the arrival of replacement outfits.

With Rumsfeld belatedly preparing to give Abizaid what he needs, the Bush administration seems to have absorbed the new political reality: sending more troops to contain the upsurge in fighting may threaten Bush's electoral prospects less than bringing greater numbers of young Americans home in coffins.

Once Again, Krugman's On Point

From his piece in today's NY Times:

Again and again, administration officials have insisted that some particular evildoer is causing all our problems. Last July they confidently predicted an end to the insurgency after Saddam's sons were killed. In December, they predicted an end to the insurgency after capturing Saddam himself. Six weeks ago - was it only six weeks? - Al Qaeda was orchestrating the insurgency, and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was the root of all evil. The obvious point that we're facing widespread religious and nationalist resentment in Iraq, which is exploited but not caused by the bad guy du jour, never seems to sink in.

The situation in Falluja seems to have been greatly exacerbated by tough-guy posturing and wishful thinking. According to The Jerusalem Post, after the murder and mutilation of American contractors, Mr. Bush told officials that "I want heads to roll." Didn't someone warn him of the likely consequences of attempting to carry out a manhunt in a hostile, densely populated urban area?

And now we have a new villain. Yesterday Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez declared that "the mission of the U.S. forces is to kill or capture Moktada al-Sadr." If and when they do, we'll hear once again that we've turned the corner. Does anyone believe it?

I'm always heartened by Paul Krugman. In fact, to a large degree, a lot of what comes off the Op-Ed pages of the Times gives me hope that these truths will sink in to the American consciousness. The chorus is only growing, with more and more calls for accountability. Will it amount to a hill of beans? Especially when the Times' news division, along with the majority of most other major media outlets, is still recycling official administration positions and calling it reporting.

The other week I had occasion to ask Gail Collins, editor for the Times' opinion page, about this disconnect, citing Krugman and Judith Miller as opposite representatives (did anyone else happen to catch John Warner on Larry King, the night of Condi's 9/11 testimony, effusing praise upon Miss Miller while planting the meme that, whatever its findings, the Commission had already devolved into a partisan affair. Watch for that to slowly fill the pages). What I gathered from her reply was that they are, in essence, two separate organizations, and there is a deliberate "wall" between the two. Subjectivity and objectivity, each cordoned off from the other. I pressed the issue: which is which? It seems obvious to me that objectivity is sorely lacking in the news division; they are handed obviously misrepresented information and present it as fact. She told me they were "doing the best they can." It seemed clear to me she meant it sincerely, though I may have sensed something deeper beneath her statement. She repeated, "They're doing the best they can." At which point, she's a very charming and approachable woman, I ceased and desisted, thanked her for her time and left.

It remains to be seen whether the press can, and will, come fully out of their self-imposed stupor and begin again to fulfil their mandate. But whatever happens with the mainstream media, there is a revolution in journalism afoot. Our primary news sources are shifting, and the control of information dissemination has passed into millions of hands. All of the issues that have been brought to light regarding 9/11, the war in Iraq, and the Bush administration in general, though under-covered (if covered at all) by the major media, have been internet driven issues. The collective action of many has stopped the government-media collusion from brushing so many things under the rug. There is hope yet.

View From the Ground

This posting from Empire Notes provides a good counterbalance to the one-sided reporting we're hearing from the American press:

Published on Monday, April 12.

Report from Fallujah – Destroying a Town in Order to Save it

Fallujah, Iraq -- On the edge of Iraq's western desert, Fallujah is extremely arid but has been rendered into an agricultural area by extensive irrigation. A town of wide streets and squat, sand-colored buildings, its population is primarily farmers.

We were in Fallujah during the "ceasefire." This is what we saw and heard.

When the assault on Fallujah started, the power plant was bombed. Electricity is provided by generators and usually reserved for places with important functions. There are four hospitals currently running in Fallujah. This includes the one where we were, which was actually just a minor emergency clinic; another one of them is a car repair garage. Things were very frantic at the hopsital where we were, so we couldn't get too much translation. We depended for much of our information on Makki al-Nazzal, a lifelong Fallujah resident who works for the humanitarian NGO Intersos, and had been pressed into service as the manager of the clinic, since all doctors were busy, working around the clock with minimal sleep.

A gentle, urbane man who spoke fluent English, Al-Nazzal was beside himself with fury at the Americans' actions (when I asked him if it was all right to use his full name, he said, "It's ok. It's all ok now. Let the bastards do what they want.") With the "ceasefire," large-scale bombing was rare. With a halt in major bombing, the Americans were attacking with heavy artillery but primarily with snipers.

Al-Nazzal told us about ambulances being hit by snipers, women and children being shot. Describing the horror that the siege of Fallujah had become, he said, "I have been a fool for 47 years. I used to believe in European and American civilization."

Tried to post this last night

***Note: there seems to be something afoot with our wireless network, which makes my blog client time out before it's able to publish....if anyone has any suggestions, they'd be appreciated. I think it may have something to do with the MTU settings on the router, but I don't know for certain.***


Some real gems coming out of the Condi Rice testimony today. I'm just now making my way through the transcript and will be writing a OpEd piece for print on today's events, but for now I wanted to get some of these posted here for further analysis later on. One thing I did notice, in the short stretch I was able to catch online this morning, is the tactic she uses to avoid answering, or to at least avoid answering directly, the questions put before her. First, she tries, as hyper-intelligent as many believe her to be, to help those less intellectually fortunate among us by providing the "back story" and performing the necessary "scene setting." Only after she has made these predetermined statements to a given inquiry topic does she begin to dance around an answer of sorts. So, with no further delay, Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Condi Rice:

BEN-VENISTE: I want to ask you some questions about the August 6, 2001, PDB. We had been advised in writing by CIA on March 19, 2004, that the August 6th PDB was prepared and self-generated by a CIA employee. Following Director Tenet's testimony on March 26th before us, the CIA clarified its version of events, saying that questions by the president prompted them to prepare the August 6th PDB.

Now, you have said to us in our meeting together earlier in February, that the president directed the CIA to prepare the August 6th PDB.

The extraordinary high terrorist attack threat level in the summer of 2001 is well-documented. And Richard Clarke's testimony about the possibility of an attack against the United States homeland was repeatedly discussed from May to August within the intelligence community, and that is well-documented.

You acknowledged to us in your interview of February 7, 2004, that Richard Clarke told you that al Qaeda cells were in the United States.

Did you tell the president, at any time prior to August 6th, of the existence of al Qaeda cells in the United States?

RICE: First, let me just make certain...

BEN-VENISTE: If you could just answer that question, because I only have a very limited...

RICE: I understand, Commissioner, but it's important...

BEN-VENISTE: Did you tell the president...

RICE: ... that I also address...

(APPLAUSE)

It's also important that, Commissioner, that I address the other issues that you have raised. So I will do it quickly, but if you'll just give me a moment.

BEN-VENISTE: Well, my only question to you is whether you...

RICE: I understand, Commissioner, but I will...

BEN-VENISTE: ... told the president.

RICE: If you'll just give me a moment, I will address fully the questions that you've asked.

First of all, yes, the August 6th PDB was in response to questions of the president -- and that since he asked that this be done. It was not a particular threat report. And there was historical information in there about various aspects of al Qaeda's operations.

Dick Clarke had told me, I think in a memorandum -- I remember it as being only a line or two -- that there were al Qaeda cells in the United States.

Now, the question is, what did we need to do about that?

And I also understood that that was what the FBI was doing, that the FBI was pursuing these al Qaeda cells. I believe in the August 6th memorandum it says that there were 70 full field investigations under way of these cells. And so there was no recommendation that we do something about this; the FBI was pursuing it.

I really don't remember, Commissioner, whether I discussed this with the president.

BEN-VENISTE: Thank you.

RICE: I remember very well that the president was aware that there were issues inside the United States. He talked to people about this. But I don't remember the al Qaeda cells as being something that we were told we needed to do something about.

BEN-VENISTE: Isn't it a fact, Dr. Rice, that the August 6th PDB warned against possible attacks in this country? And I ask you whether you recall the title of that PDB?

RICE: I believe the title was, "Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the United States."

Now, the...

BEN-VENISTE: Thank you.

RICE: No, Mr. Ben-Veniste...

BEN-VENISTE: I will get into the...

RICE: I would like to finish my point here.

BEN-VENISTE: I didn't know there was a point.

Lest We Forget

There are human beings on the ground throughout Iraq, neither insurgent nor coalition soldiers, who are living in the midst of this violence and madness. I've been trying to read all the Iraqi blogs I can get my hands on, and coupled with first hand accounts from fleeing journalists I feel a growing sense of dread. Not only for American operations in Iraq, though I fear our soldiers are seeing the very beginning of a long and bloody war of attrition, but for the innocents who find themselves caught in the middle of these opposing factions. Raed's mother Faiza made this heartbreaking post yesterday evening:

Wednesday, April07 ,2004
Dear Raed…
Baghdad is calm today…
But it is seems like a frightening silence that hides a big explosion…
We asked in the morning about the bombs of yesterday…
It appeared that the American tanks were targeting some shops in the main market.
Thank God those shops were closed.
But many people told us that they saw an American APC burning in the night and it was removed in the early morning…
Americans are gathering near the entrance of our neighborhood…
Tanks and soldiers with machine guns…
They look terrifying…
They are staying away from the centers of the Iraqis with RPGs...
Everyone is expecting another long night full of violence…
We will spend the night in the "Safe Room",
The one we used to hide in last year during the war!
The news of Falluja is not clear,
But I heard that people are arranging a blood donation campaign.
They say that hospitals are full with injured and killed people.
Only god can protect us from what's happening…
These days are much darker than the days of Saddam Husein.

I pray to God the family is safe. When I showed Faiza's post to my wife last night, what struck her was the language of the post itself. "My God," she said to me, eyes wide, "the poor woman. Who talks like that? American APCs and RPGs--what sort of talk is that for a mother?" The vocabulary you pick up on, living in a warzone...

I had thought the ultimate eventual outcome of a botched occupation and politically hastened withdrawal would be a four-pronged civil war in Iraq, Kurds, Shi'a, Sunnis and the coalition, but for now that seems to be at least one front too many. There's every possibility that post-occupation, whenever, if ever, that may be, the Shi'ite and Sunni populations (at least those who represent the current uprising) will again turn on each other, but for the time being they have found a common enemy in the US and have publicly declared their mutual cooperation and common goal. The Kurds, no doubt, must be getting nervous as well. The violence is not limited to the Sunni triangle and the southern Shiite cities. It has reached northward into at least Kirkuk.

This is a horrible and bloody entanglement George bush has led America into, a disturbing situation of our own making. Now though, any possible answer must necessarily preclude abandoning Iraq (which would surely explode into civil war). We can't leave. You would expect to see a president and his secretary of state canvassing the globe for assistance in the face of a situation such as this. Civilians are being abducted and taken hostage throughout the country. Battles are raging in nearly every major population center and as of this writing (earlier actually, since I'm writing disconnected from the Web) Shi'ite militiamen have taken at least partial control of two cities and are in full command of a third.

Now is the time to be engaging, NATO, the UN, Muslim Arab nations; the time to build the sort of broad based coalition necessary to undertake what is not only the most ambitious "nation building" effort in modern history, but who's outcome is also a matter of grave importance to entire world. The sort of coalition Bush would have needed to make this action a success in the first place. Hat in hand if need be, we need to be gathering aid and support for this undertaking. The Bush administration never ceases to amaze me. As always, there is but one arrow in his quiver; as he has his one economic strategy, tax cuts, whether they perform as promised or not, he has but one understanding of military action. Answer any and every threat with a show of massive force.

Richard Clarke hit the nail on the head when he revealed the Iraqi policy as a major strategic blunder in the wider war on terrorism. Possibly owing to their general disrespect for counter-terrorism operations pre-9/11 and therefore a simple lack of education on the matter, they still seem to be unable to get their heads around what sort of enemy we're up against. By our actions in Iraq, we have not only turned bin Laden's propaganda into prophecy (a major recruiting point for al Qaeda had always been what they saw as America's ultimate aim: to invade and occupy an oil-rich Muslim country), we keep feeding into his strategic goal. Massive shows of military force destroy civilian lives. Lives, God forbid, like those of Faiza's family. These same military operations only serve to steel the resolve of guerillas, and terrorists. By proving ourselves a violent and oppressive occupying force, we personify the prevailing understanding of America as an imperialist force in the world. As former NSC staff member Jessica Stern says in her opinon piece in Salon:

The war in Iraq has split the allies, not the terrorists. It has turned Iraq into a Mecca for international terrorists, and mobilized local Shiite and Salafi jihadist groups that had previously posed a minimal threat. It has facilitated connections between terrorists and those with formal military experience in Saddam's army, the lethal nightmare that the invasion was supposed to have thwarted. Antipathy toward the United States, not only in Iraq and throughout the entire Islamic world, but in Europe as well, has become a dangerous trend exploited by terrorists. Even as we tout our successes in rounding up al-Qaida terrorists, the broader movement inspired by bin Laden and ignited by the invasion of Iraq is recruiting new nihilist minions throughout the world. The war in Iraq has not only been a distraction from the war on terrorism; it has strengthened our enemies in ways that continue to surprise and horrify us. Where will we be surprised next?

Let's also not forget that, before the coalition had padlocked its doors, Moqtada Sadr's newspaper may have been printing inflammatory articles, but his followers had not yet picked up gun one. In addition to showing characteristic hypocrisy (establishing a democracy on the one hand while quashing a free press with the other) by taking this action, by shutting down a voice and venue for ideas (no matter how unpalatable), they have unwittingly turned words and ideas into deadly action, into bullets and grenades, casulties and hostages. And they have, at last, proven Bush to be the uniter, and not divider, he promised to be. That he has united historic enemies in the common goal of driving American forces from Iraq while dividing America itself like at no other time in modern history, would bring even the most hardened soul some pause. I can only wonder what George Bush tells himself when it comes to this sad irony.

Hostage Taking Continues

Obviously a strategy. Seems awfully familiar. No Americans have been reported taken capitve yet, but the Brits aren't so lucky:

Briton Kidnapped in Southern Iraq Town

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A British civilian was kidnapped this week in the southern Iraqi town of Nassiriya, the scene of heavy fighting between radical Shi'ite militiamen and Italian troops, a coalition official said on Thursday.

The official named the man as Gary Teeley, a British contractor.

A Foreign Office official in London confirmed that Teeley was missing, but would not say what he was doing in Iraq (news - web sites) or comment on the manner of his disappearance.

"He is missing. We were first made aware of this on Monday, April 5. We are in touch with his next of kin and the appropriate military and civilian authorities. I don't have any further information," a spokeswoman told Reuters.

An active pattern of kidnapping civilians is afoot. Bargaining chipes from coalition partner countries. Ugly and getting uglier.

Definition

quagmire
noun [C]

a situation that can easily trap you so that you become involved with problems from which it is difficult to escape

Consider the Fan Hit

Condi's on, streaming from C-SPAN, and more on that later, but looks to be a dark cloud day no matter how her testimony falls:

Afghan City Falls to Strongman as Troops Fly In

By Sayed Salahuddin

KABUL (Reuters) - Forces of a renegade adviser to Afghan President Hamid Karzai have overrun the capital of a northern province, a defense ministry official said on Thursday.

Forces of ethnic Uzbek strongman General Abdul Rashid Dostum invaded Faryab province on Wednesday, prompting the central government to dispatch national army troops there on Thursday in an attempt to restore order.

"Both the governor and the commander have fled. Dostum's forces have overrun Maimana," said a defense ministry official, who did not want to be identified.

and:

Gunmen Take Seven Koreans Hostage in Iraq

SEOUL (Reuters) - Seven South Korean members of a church group have been taken hostage by armed men in Iraq (news - web sites), the South Korean foreign ministry said on Thursday.

An Iraqi group detained the seven church ministers earlier on Thursday near Baghdad. One female member escaped, the ministry said in a statement.

The identity of the group and whereabouts of the Koreans were not known, it said.

Kim Sang-mee, who escaped the gunmen, told South Korea (news - web sites)'s MBC TV that several Iraqis armed with guns and dressed like civilians stopped cars and took away the rest of her group, which had been on its way to Baghdad from Jordan.

and:

Jazeera Airs Video of Japanese Held by Iraq Group

DUBAI (Reuters) - Arab television Al Jazeera aired a video on Thursday showing three Japanese, including one woman, it said were taken hostage by an Iraqi group vowing to kill them if Japan does not leave Iraq (news - web sites).

A statement by the hitherto unknown Iraqi group called Saraya al-Mujahideen (Mujahideen Brigades), shown by the channel, gave Japan three days from the airing of the video to withdraw its troops from Iraq before it killed the hostages.

The Arabic statement said Japan had betrayed Iraqis by supporting the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

and:

Militiamen Control Parts of 3 Iraq Cities

The militia led by radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has full control over the city of Kut and partial control in Najaf, but coalition forces will move soon to break their hold, said Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the top U.S. general in Iraq (news - web sites) said. Residents of Kufa said militiamen also control that southern city by holding police stations and government buildings.

and:

Arabs From Israel Said Kidnapped in Iraq

JERUSALEM - Two aid workers who are Arab residents of Jerusalem — including one with a Georgia driver's license — were kidnapped Thursday by insurgents in Iraq (news - web sites), Israeli media reported.

Footage from Iranian television, rebroadcast by Israeli TV, showed photographs of the men's documents, including an Israeli driver's license, an Israeli health insurance card and a supermarket card.

The footage showed one of the men, Nabil Razouk, 30, had a U.S. driver's license from the state of Georgia. The other captive was identified as Ahmed Yassin Tikati, 33. Both men said on TV that they were international aid workers.

and let's not forget this gem from yesterday:

Former Iraqi enemies unite to fight U.S.

BAGHDAD, Iraq, April 6 (UPI) -- The American dream to bridge ancient Iraqi sectarian rivalries turned nightmarish Tuesday as Shiite and Sunni religious and tribal figures put aside their differences and publicly aligned against the occupation, vowing to rid Iraq of the American-led invaders....

... There are also indications that the two groups have come to an agreement to join with an al-Qaida affiliated terrorist group thought to have conducted widespread terrorist attacks against U.S. and Iraqi targets alike.....

.... This development would have been unthinkable a week ago as the previous resistance organizations have been led by religious Sunni -- who consider the Shiite heretics in Islam -- and former Baath members whose secular regime brutally oppressed the Shiites for decades.

But even as U.S. tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles surrounded Sadr's headquarters in a vast Shiite neighborhood named for his father, emissaries arrived from the tribal leaders of Sunni regions and from the largest resistance movement in Iraq to offer their services to Sadr in his fight against the Americans.

Inside the Sadr office building, which was defended by about 100 armed and 400 unarmed men and boys, was cordoned off by the U.S. military, three obviously Sunni clerics arrived with a letter for the leaders of the Mehdi Army.

"We have come to see how our friends are doing," Sheikh Hudor al-Abari told United Press International.

Dear Leader

***note*** What follows is an editorial piece pulled from print before publication, posted here in its entirety****

We're living in a very precarious moment in history. I don't mean to overstate the issue, and I do not. In fact, I've been known to confide to friends that while I am concerned that electronic touch-screen voting systems could easily provide an election night that would make 2000's look crystal clear, I'm not sure we'll even see an election come November.

If Bush's poll numbers continue to fall, and there's every indication they may, his campaign will pull out all stops, use every insidious tool at their disposal to bolster his standing or risk losing it all. The power of the tools a sitting president enjoys is formidable to say the least. The further along we get with this administration, the less I'm willing to put anything past them.

For instance, take Bush's recent trip to "visit" the troops at Ft. Polk in Louisiana. Old Glory, larger than life, barn-sized above hundreds of America's bravest young men and women, many seated cross legged on the floor. Bush, stepping out onto the stage, swaggering his familiar swagger and approaching the mike to thunderous applause. And then He spoke.

It was just another of many made-for-TV moment in the Bush presidency. This one, though, it freaked me out, in all honesty. I'm an avid watcher of the History Channel, and when I see world leaders staging militaristic propaganda like this, it makes me nervous. There's too much precedent, too many horrors borne of this kind of stuff.

No, this is not to say that Bush is Hitler, or Mussolini, or Stalin, or Saddam, or Kim Jung Il, or any of the other leaders who took, and still take in the Korean dictator's case, great pleasure in projecting an image of themselves at one with the military, donning uniforms now and again to further solidify the idea in the minds of those who watch. I'd never claim such a thing.

Still, he worries me. The president gives little credence to not only his detractors, but anything at all that might cause friction with his world view; he's said as much himself. We shouldn't worry, though, the president knows best after all, and will protect us from harm. To hear him tell it, there's nothing anyone could say or do to convince him he could be wrong.

Not that he's proven himself capable of this kind of protection, however. Nine years passed between the two terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. The fact that we haven't seen another devastating attack on US soil since 9/11 has less to do with Bush's bravado, Tom Ridge's duct tape, or John Ashcroft's war on civil liberties than it does the fundamental truth about Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda.

I hope this doesn't shock anyone, but they're not the manifestation of Evil, no matter how many times we're told they are. A group of criminal thugs should be treated as such, not raised to the level of Antichrist, as Gen. Boykin might say. It gives them too much credit, and we've already seen how it "plays on the Arab street." When the world's sole superpower invests this much legitimacy in Osama, he rises to folkloric, messianic, standing and his influence grows by leaps and bounds.

Of course, that's not the way Bush sees it. He too has risen to messianic heights, but by trouncing these Evildoers with a twist of his mouth, Biblical rhetoric, and the awesome power of the US Military. Relegating the perpetrators of the attacks against us to their rightful criminal status would make his actions seem far too grandiose and overblown. So instead we are a nation at war with a shadowy enemy, an enemy we should fear and to whom we should overact, fighting, as we are, this unending war, lasting for generations.

Well, another four years at least. Another four years of color-coded commandeering of the news cycle and doing whatever it takes to validate this "war presidency." After all, what does a war president do when there are no true wars to fight?

It's when I consider, and reconsider, Gen. Tommy Frank's statements to that bastion of investigative journalism, Cigar Aficionado, that I truly shudder to think any further. In between discussing his taste in cigars, he discusses what might happen in the event of a catastrophic terrorist attack involving WMD here or abroad.

In such a case, he says, "the Western world, the free world, loses what it cherishes most, and that is freedom and liberty we've seen for a couple of hundred years in this grand experiment that we call democracy." He goes on to say we'd see the rise of a military government, and our beloved Constitution come "unraveled" The Constitution. Unraveled. Here or abroad, he says. Here, or abroad. God help us is if it's here. God help us if it's anywhere. Election year politics would be the last thing we'd have to worry about.

First Thorn Thrown

In the months since I've shifted my writing focus from literary fiction to political matters and begun publishing opinion pieces in the papers down here in Mississippi, I've become a lightening rod of sorts. When Buzzflash links to one of my pieces, the emails flow in, but that's not what I mean. Buzzflash readers are the choir, after all. It's the people I speak to from around Mississippi that I speak of. The level of vitriol felt, even here in the reddest of red states, against this president is startling.


Of course, as you'd expect, those who feel this way are a minority. So many around the South will stand by Bush no matter what. He's equated with love of God and country and if you question why, you'r as likely to get a red and roaring response as a quizzical stare. It is, as the media is so often telling us, a very polarized atmosphere. I can only assume it will grow more so.


But, as I say, I do hear from people, people happy to see their own thoughts voiced in print. The problem with newspaper publishing for a freelance writer though, is that there is no regular outlet. While I'm an avid reader of some wonderful blogs, and I am producing much more than is finding its way into print, I've had a hard time shaking my fiction-writer's mentality, requiring third-party publication as validation. Without the ink, I thought, there's no reason anyone would read. Add the fact that the Web is full of very capable bloggers with greater proximity to both sources and events than I, and it just never made practical sense for me to launch my own.


That was then. The responses I've received to my editorials have been so heartening, thoughtful, and encouraging that I've decided to give this a go. We'll see if anyone is listening and if I have anything to add to the debate. I think I might, and seeing as how the coming months are nothing less than Zero Hour for America, when push has come to shove, I've convinced myself it's my duty as well.


Also, and I'm afraid this won't come as a surprise to anyone, the sad truth is that there are limits to what you can say within the confines of the Op-Ed page. If you ever want to see print, that is.There's only so far even the most adventurous editor will go. With the stakes so high, and make no mistake but that they are, it's crucial to have an entirely unfiltered public outlet. So, in the spirit of truth, I give you The Thorn Papers, my own meager attempt to keep America's eye on the ball, to keep the facts out in the open and up for debate. We're in a fight for our lives here. Never forget it.