Life in OUR America, Volume 2, The Livyjr Files Options

[Livyjr]

And here is something that I am supporting:

"Inquiry on road to war begins - Democrats build case for Bush impeachment over Iraq invasion, citing British memo"

By STEWART M. POWELL, Washington bureau, Albany, New York Times Union
First published: Friday, June 17, 2005

WASHINGTON -- Democratic critics on Thursday began building a case for the impeachment of President Bush for allegedly taking the nation to war in Iraq on false pretenses.

Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee and a veteran of impeachment proceedings against President Richard M. Nixon in 1974, launched an unofficial, Democrats-only inquiry into allegations that Bush contrived U.S. intelligence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction to justify a long-planned U.S.-British invasion to overthrow Saddam Hussein.

The Conyers hearing lacked official standing because it wasn't authorized by the Republican leaders of the House.

Nonetheless, the forum invoked all the trappings of an official congressional inquiry -- including sworn testimony, American flags and coverage by C-Span -- as Conyers publicly demanded that Bush "explain his actions" for going to war on what may have been "false pretenses" and "false information."

The inquiry was triggered by the publication last month of secret minutes of the British war cabinet in July 2002 indicating that Bush may have deceived Congress eight months before the invasion of Iraq when he publicly claimed he was pressing for a diplomatic end to the standoff over suspected weapons of mass destruction when he was secretly laying the groundwork for war.

The minutes -- dubbed the "Downing Street Memo" because the meeting was held at No. 10 Downing Street, the prime minister's official residence -- have never been disowned by the government of British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

The document quoted Sir Richard Dearlove, then-head of British intelligence, telling that his recent meetings in Washington showed "a perceptible shift in attitude" to the point that U.S.-led military action against Iraq was "now seen as inevitable."

Bush "wanted to remove Saddam through military action justified by the conjunction of terrorism and (weapons of mass destruction)," Dearlove said.

"But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."

Conyers, a 41-year veteran of Congress, said those notes from the British Cabinet meeting mean that more than 1,700 American GIs and hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis "have lost their lives for a lie."

Republicans who control both the House and Senate withheld their formal approval of the Conyers' forum, which was attended by nearly two dozen House Democrats.

The event was the first sign of political momentum for a grass-roots effort by some Democrats and anti-war organizations to pressure the Republican-controlled House to open preliminary impeachment proceedings against the President.

Conyers later delivered to the White House a letter from 122 House Democrats to Bush and petitions signed by 500,000 people asking the commander-in-chief to respond to a list of questions based on the minutes of the British cabinet meeting.

Critics of Bush and opponents of the war held a rally across the street from the White House in Lafayette Park.

Earlier this month, Bush and Blair denied at a joint White House news conference that they had secretly agreed in advance to invade Iraq before seeking authorization by the U.N. Security Council or that they had "fixed" pre-war intelligence to justify an invasion.

Thursday, White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan rebuffed Conyers' inquiry, saying Bush has no plans to respond to the letter.

Conyers "voted against the war in the first place and is simply trying to rehash old debates that have already been addressed," McClellan said.

"Our focus is not on the past."

"It's on the future and working to make sure we succeed in Iraq."

Conyers' mock congressional hearing packed roughly three dozen lawmakers, congressional staffers, soldiers' relatives, television crews and reporters into a Capitol hideaway conference room under the control of Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., the House Democratic leader.

Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner Jr., R-Wis., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, had rejected Conyers' request to use a more spacious committee hearing room for the unauthorized hearing.

Conyers staged his hearing as two Republicans and two Democrats proposed a non-binding House resolution that would require the President to announce by the end of the year a plan to begin withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq by Oct. 1, 2006 -- one month before the midterm congressional elections.

The sponsors were Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C.; Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas; Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio; and Rep. Neil Abercrombie, D-Hawaii.

[Livyjr]

And here is something that I am supporting:

"Inquiry on road to war begins - Democrats build case for Bush impeachment over Iraq invasion, citing British memo" 
 
By STEWART M. POWELL, Washington bureau, Albany, New York Times Union
First published: Friday, June 17, 2005

WASHINGTON -- Democratic critics on Thursday began building a case for the impeachment of President Bush for allegedly taking the nation to war in Iraq on false pretenses.

Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee and a veteran of impeachment proceedings against President Richard M. Nixon in 1974, launched an unofficial, Democrats-only inquiry into allegations that Bush contrived U.S. intelligence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction to justify a long-planned U.S.-British invasion to overthrow Saddam Hussein.

And here is a slightly different version of this same story, from the AP.

I include it because of the quotes that are not in the one above:

"Democrats urge inquiry on Bush, Iraq"

By PETE YOST, Associated Press
Last updated: 3:41 a.m., Friday, June 17, 2005

WASHINGTON -- Amid new questions about President Bush's drive to topple Saddam Hussein, several House Democrats urged lawmakers on Thursday to conduct an official inquiry to determine whether the president intentionally misled Congress.

At a public forum where the word "impeachment" loomed large, Exhibit A was the so-called Downing Street memo, a prewar document leaked from inside the British government to The Sunday Times of London a month and a half ago.

Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, organized the event.

counting a meeting of Prime Minister Tony Blair's national security team, the memo says the Bush administration believed that war was inevitable and was determined to use intelligence about weapons of mass destruction to justify the ouster of Saddam

"The intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy", one of the participants was quoted as saying at the meeting, which took place just after British officials returned from Washington.

The president "may have deliberately deceived the United States to get us into a war", Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., said.

"Was the president of the United States a fool or a knave?"

The Democratic congressmen were relegated to a tiny room in the bottom of the Capitol and the Republicans who run the House scheduled 11 major votes to coincide with the afternoon event.

"We have not been told the truth," Cindy Sheehan, whose soldier son was killed in Baghdad a year ago, told the Democrats.

"If this administration doesn't have anything to hide, they should be down here testifying."

The White House refuses to respond to a May 5 letter from 122 congressional Democrats about whether there was a coordinated effort to "fix" the intelligence and facts around the policy, as the Downing Street memo says.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan says Conyers "is simply trying to rehash old debates."

Conyers and a half-dozen other members of Congress were stopped at the White House gate later Thursday when they hand-delivered petitions signed by 560,000 Americans who want Bush to provide a detailed response to the Downing Street memo.

When Conyers couldn't get in, an anti-war demonstrator shouted, "Send Bush out!"

Eventually, White House aides retrieved the petitions at the gate and took them into the West Wing.

"Quite frankly, evidence that appears to be building up points to whether or not the president has deliberately misled Congress to make the most important decision a president has to make, going to war," Rep. Charles Rangel of New York, senior Democrat on the House Ways and Means Committee, said earlier at the event on Capitol Hill.

Misleading Congress is an impeachable offense, a point that Rangel underscored by saying he's already been through two impeachments.

He referred to the impeachment of President Clinton for an affair with a White House intern and of President Nixon for Watergate, even though Nixon resigned to avoid impeachment.

Conyers pointed to statements by Bush in the run-up to invasion that war would be a last resort.

"The veracity of those statements has -- to put it mildly -- come into question," he said.

Former Ambassador Joseph Wilson said, "We are having this discussion today because we failed to have it three years ago when we went to war."

"It used to be said that democracies were difficult to mobilize for war precisely because of the debate required," Wilson said, going on to say the lack of debate in this case allowed the war to happen.

Wilson wrote a 2003 newspaper opinion piece criticizing the Bush administration's claim that Iraq had sought uranium in Niger.

After the piece appeared someone in the Bush administration leaked the identity of Wilson's wife as a CIA operative, exposing her cover.

Wilson has said he believes the leak was retaliation for his critical comments.

The Justice Department is investigating.

John Bonifaz, a lawyer and co-founder of a new group called http://AfterDowningStreet.org , said the lack of interest by congressional Republicans in the Downing Street memo is like Congress during Nixon's presidency saying "we don't want" the Watergate tapes.

[jeffmoskin]

"The veracity of those statements has -- to put it mildly -- come into question," he said.

To put it very mildly.

[Livyjr]

To put it very mildly.

And it's time to do something about it, America!

Get intelligent, and then demand equal representation!

And please, go to this site http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6862172/ and vote on these following questions:

As of 4:15 PM EST:

Are you concerned about the so-called "Downing Street Memos" -- which appear to imply that U.S. intelligence and facts were "fixed" to help justify the war in Iraq? * 1594 responses

Yes 95%

No 5%

Do you approve of the way President Bush is handling his job? * 1593 responses

Yes 5%

No 95%

What's most to blame for shortfalls in military recruitment? * 1579 responses

Negative reporting in the mainstream media 4%

Ongoing violence in Iraq 82%

Parents discouraging sons and daughters from joining 13%

end survey

That last question should have had "an untrustworthy, incompetent Commander-in-Chief" as a category, because all 3 categories above on that last question all go back to that one thing, which is everything!

[Livyjr]

And it's time to do something about it, America!

Get intelligent, and then demand equal representation!

And please, go to this site http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6862172/ and vote on these following questions:

As of 4:15 PM EST:

Are you concerned about the so-called "Downing Street Memos" -- which appear to imply that U.S. intelligence and facts were "fixed" to help justify the war in Iraq?  * 1594 responses 

Yes 95% 

No 5% 

For information on the Downing Street Memorandum to assist you in coming to an informed decision which represents your own values, go to this URL, now:

http://www.downingstreetmemo.com/

[Livyjr]

And it's time to do something about it, America!

Get intelligent, and then demand equal representation!

And please, go to this site http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6862172/ and vote on these following questions:

As of 4:15 PM EST:

Do you approve of the way President Bush is handling his job? * 1593 responses 

Yes 5% 

No 95% 

And in addition to being very much in favor of impeaching George W. Bush for trying to cover up the fact that he intended to wage aggressive war against Iraq by lying to Congress about some non-existent weapons of mass destruction, I'd also like to see these corporate crooks up on a scaffold, like they used to do over there in England .....

Corporate Scandals

"Ex-Tyco CEO Dennis Kozlowski found guilty - Former finance chief Mark Swartz also convicted of looting firm"

BREAKING NEWS

The Associated Press

Updated: 4:11 p.m. ET June 17, 2005

NEW YORK - Former Tyco CEO Dennis Kozlowski and a second executive were convicted Friday of looting their company of more than $600 million to fund extravagant lifestyles featuring expensive jewelry, an opulent Manhattan apartment and a gaudy Mediterranean birthday party.

A state court jury deliberated over 11 days before returning the verdict in the second prosecution of Kozlowski, 58, and Mark H. Swartz, 44, the conglomerate’s former finance chief.

Both were convicted of grand larceny, falsifying business records, securities fraud and other charges.

The verdict came after a four-month trial in Manhattan state Supreme Court.

They now face up to 30 years in prison on their convictions —the maximum sentence for both under the law, prosecutors said.

The pair had testified they were unaware of any wrongdoing when they accepted the money and loans.

“We are disappointed, and we will deal with this on appeal,” promised Swartz’s attorney, Charles Stillman.

Although prosecutors called for the pair to be jailed pending sentencing, both were allowed to remain free on $10 million bail apiece.

Their dejected wives sat in the courtroom, their heads hanging, as the jury foreman intoned guilty verdict after guilty verdict against the pair —22 for each.

Kozlowski and Swartz, who were each acquitted of just one charge, are due back in court Aug. 2 for a pre-sentencing hearing.

The pair joins a string of executives convicted in recent months in high-profile corporate wrongdoing cases, among them former WorldCom CEO Bernard Ebbers and Adelphia Communications Corp. founder John Rigas and his son, Timothy.

Richard Scrushy, founder and former chief executive at HealthSouth Corp., is on trial on fraud charges and awaiting a jury verdict in federal court in Birmingham, Ala.

And former Enron Corp. executives Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling are scheduled to go on trial early next year.

The first trial of the former Tyco International Ltd. executives ended in an April 2004 mistrial because a juror, identified by a newspaper as a holdout for acquittal, received a menacing telephone call and letter.

Although prosecutors called for the pair to be jailed pending sentencing, both were allowed to remain free on $10 million bail apiece.

Their disappointed wives sat in the courtroom, their heads hanging, as the jury foreman intoned guilty verdict after guilty verdict on the 31 counts against the pair.

Accused of looting firm

The defendants were accused of enriching themselves by nearly $600 million by taking unauthorized pay and bonuses, abusing loan programs and selling their company stock at inflated prices after lying about Tyco’s finances.

Often, prosecutors said, the defendants hid their alleged thefts by failing to disclose the bonuses and loan forgivenesses in company prospectuses and federal filings, and bought the silence of underlings with outsized compensation.

Both used Tyco’s money to buy extravagant lifestyles that featured art, jewelry and real estate, prosecutors said.

An example of that spending was the gaudy $2 million party Kozlowski threw for wife Karen’s 40th birthday on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia, they said.

Tyco paid about half of the party’s cost.

The prosecution’s emphasis in the first trial on the lavish spending was pared in the second.

Less time was spent on the Manhattan apartment that Kozlowski said he bought for Tyco, which with an $18 million purchase price and furnishings that included a $6,000 shower curtain, raised the cost of the place to more than $30 million.

Lawyers for Kozlowski, with Tyco from 1975 until 2002, and Swartz, who joined Tyco in 1991 and left in 2002, said the executives believed they were acting lawfully when they accepted compensation and loan forgivenesses or spent Tyco’s money.

There was no criminal intent by either man, they said, and therefore there were no crimes.

A major difference in the second trial was four days of testimony by Kozlowski, who did not testify in the first.

He told the jury that he never abused Tyco loan programs or received a bonus to which he was not entitled, and that he never stole anything.

Asked by one of his lawyers, Stephen Kaufman, why a $25 million bonus that he received as a loan forgiveness from the company did not appear on his 1999 tax return, Kozlowski said he could not explain why.

“I just was not thinking when I signed my tax return that I had a $25 million loan forgiveness,” Kozlowski said.

“Year in and year out at Tyco, my tax returns for the most part had been correct."

"I didn’t pick up on it.”

Prosecutors called Kozlowski’s explanation for this omission and for other actions by him and Swartz “ludicrous,” and “despicable.”

[Livyjr]

And it's time to do something about it, America!

Get intelligent, and then demand equal representation!

And please, go to this site http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6862172/ and vote on these following questions:

As of 4:15 PM EST:

What's most to blame for shortfalls in military recruitment? * 1579 responses 

Negative reporting in the mainstream media 4% 

Ongoing violence in Iraq 82% 

Parents discouraging sons and daughters from joining 13% 

end survey

That last question should have had "an untrustworthy, incompetent Commander-in-Chief" as a category, because all 3 categories above on that last question all go back to that one thing, which is everything!

And speaking of George W. Bush .....

"U.S. jets drop 500 lb bombs in Iraq operation"

By Luke Baker

Fri Jun 17,11:04 AM ET

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. F-16 fighter planes dropped a series of 500 lb (220 kg) bombs on insurgent targets in western Iraq overnight as the U.S. military launched a heavy offensive against rebels near the Syrian border.

Nine of the powerful bombs were dropped, the U.S. military said, two of them targeting suspected rebel safe houses near the town of Qaim, an insurgent stronghold on the Euphrates river about 20 km (12 miles) east of Iraq's border with Syria.

Four more were aimed at rebels as they fired mortars and assault rifles at U.S. ground forces near Qaim, and a further three were used to hit suspected weapons caches in the area.

The air power was in support of Operation Spear, the third major offensive U.S. forces have launched in western Iraq in the past six weeks with the aim of crushing insurgent activity in the Euphrates valley which stretches northwest to Syria.

"Operation Spear ... began in the early morning hours with the objectives of rooting out insurgents and foreign fighters and disrupting insurgent support systems in and around Karabila," Captain Jeffrey Pool of the U.S. Marines said in a statement from Ramadi, capital of the surrounding Anbar region.

Iraqi troops and U.S. tank and amphibious assault units were involved, he added.

About 1,000 troops were taking part in all.

Residents in Karabila, a suburb of Qaim where the suspected weapons caches were targeted, said fierce gunbattles broke out overnight and continued.

U.S. forces said air strikes killed about 40 rebels near there on June 11.

The leader in Qaim of the Muslim Clerics Association, a leading voice for the once-dominant Sunni Arab minority, said he was calling for businesses to remain closed and residents to stay in their homes after weekly Friday prayers in protest at U.S. action he said was endangering civilians.

"The U.S. forces are escalating the situation and we will declare a general strike after Friday prayers," the Association's Mudhafar al-Ani said.

The chief doctor at Qaim hospital, Hamdi al-Alusi, said six bodies had been brought to the morgue on Friday, including one of a woman.

The identities of the five men were unclear.

It was unclear how much resistance U.S. forces were meeting, but a U.S. Black Hawk helicopter made an "unscheduled landing" near Qusayba, 20 km (12 miles) west of Qaim, the military said.

Pool said it was not shot down.

AMERICAN DISQUIET

The western, desert regions of Iraq provide strongholds for Sunni insurgents battling U.S. forces and the new, Shi'ite-led government.

Iraqi and U.S. officials say Arab foreign fighters have been entering from Syria, although Damascus rejects accusations of helping them do that.

It is also believed to be the main hideout of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian militant whose al Qaeda-linked group has carried out many of the deadliest attacks in Iraq and who U.S. forces believe is behind a recent surge in violence.

Since late April, more than 1,000 Iraqis and 120 U.S. troops have died in rebel attacks.

That may help explain a declining approval rating for President Bush at home.

A CBS/New York Times poll released on Thursday said 60 percent of Americans thought things were going badly for the United States in Iraq.

Fifty-one percent now think Washington should have stayed out of Iraq.

In Baghdad, a suicide car bomber blew up his vehicle as an Iraqi security patrol was passing a Shi'ite mosque, wounding four people and causing a fuel truck to explode, police said.

Another car exploded near the convoy of an Iraqi general in Falluja, killing two civilians and wounding 11, officials said.

Tensions have been high between the minority Sunni Arabs, from where the insurgency draws support, and the dominant Shi'ite sect since the government was formed in late April.

Despite tensions, Sunni Arab and Shi'ite leaders managed to strike a compromise on Thursday over the makeup of a committee charged with drafting a new constitution.

(Additional reporting by Alastair Macdonald, Luke Baker and Lutfi Abu-oun in Baghdad)

end quotes

NO COUNTRY, and especially OUR America, should ever go to war with an incompetent as the leader of its military forces!

SO!

I'm surprised so many people in OUR America did not realize that in November of 2004, which is quite a testimonial to the power of the lies that this Bush Co. was able to barrage the American people with, in the months leading up to November 2004, when Americans took the worst possible choice for Commander-in-Chief of OUR military forces, and made him president of OUR America!

[Livyjr]

And speaking of George W. Bush .....

"U.S. jets drop 500 lb bombs in Iraq operation"

By Luke Baker

Fri Jun 17,11:04 AM ET

Since late April, more than 1,000 Iraqis and 120 U.S. troops have died in rebel attacks.

That may help explain a declining approval rating for President Bush at home.

A CBS/New York Times poll released on Thursday said 60 percent of Americans thought things were going badly for the United States in Iraq.

Fifty-one percent now think Washington should have stayed out of Iraq.

end quotes

NO COUNTRY, and especially OUR America, should ever go to war with an incompetent as the leader of its military forces!

SO!

I'm surprised so many people in OUR America did not realize that in November of 2004, which is quite a testimonial to the power of the lies that this Bush Co. was able to barrage the American people with, in the months leading up to November 2004, when Americans took the worst possible choice for Commander-in-Chief of OUR military forces, and made him president of OUR America!

June 17, 2005 latimes.com

"War Criticism and Concerns Both Growing - A bipartisan group of lawmakers wants to see a plan to withdraw troops from Iraq. A general cites the need to gain more public support."

By John Hendren and Cynthia H. Cho, Times Staff Writers

WASHINGTON — Apprehension over the war in Iraq surged Thursday as a group of lawmakers demanded that President Bush develop plans to withdraw troops and a top Pentagon official expressed concern about sagging public support for the U.S. military effort.

After a deadly increase in violence in Iraq, congressional critics of the war grew more vocal in demanding a change in policy, and antiwar activists staged a rally near the White House.

The White House said Bush planned to deliver a speech this month on the importance of the U.S. mission, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice pledged to work harder to explain the administration's objectives.

"I'm going to, like I think all members of the administration, perhaps try to do more to get out to the public to talk about what it is we are trying to achieve and what it is we are achieving," Rice said at a news conference.

"So I would say this is not going to be an American enterprise for the long term."

The setbacks have triggered growing concern at the Pentagon, where a senior general said he was worried about declining public support.

"It is concerning that our public isn't as supportive as perhaps they once were," said Marine Lt. Gen. James T. Conway, director of operations for the Pentagon's Joint Staff.

"We'd like, I believe, to try to reverse those figures and start the trend back the other direction."

"Because it's extremely important to the soldier and the Marine, the airman and the sailor over there, to know that their country's behind them."

Conway alluded to the precedent of Vietnam, in which plummeting public support for the war was blamed for undercutting the U.S. effort.

A Gallup poll this week found that about 6 in 10 Americans advocated a partial or full withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.

This month, an Associated Press-Ipsos poll found that 41% of Americans approved of how Bush was handling Iraq, the president's worst grade to date.

Insurgent attacks have claimed the lives of hundreds of Iraqi civilians in recent weeks.

Eighty-eight U.S. troops died in May and 45 were killed in the first half of June, the highest level since 126 troops were slain in January, before the Iraqi election.

As of Thursday, at least 1,713 U.S. troops had been killed since the start of the war.

Drawing a parallel with Vietnam, Conway recounted the story of a Marine colonel negotiating the U.S. withdrawal with his Vietnamese counterpart in 1975.

"And the Marine said to him, 'We beat you every time on the battlefield,'" Conway said.

"And the Vietnamese colonel said, 'That is true, but it's also irrelevant.'"

"And the fact is, they realized what I think our contemporary enemy realizes — that American public opinion is the center of gravity," Conway said.

"That a democracy can't do certain things if, in fact, the citizens don't support it."

Conway said U.S. commanders in Iraq were against an "artificially imposed deadline" for a withdrawal of troops — a subject debated Thursday on Capitol Hill.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced a resolution that would require Bush to submit a plan for troop withdrawal by the end of the year and to begin the pullout by October 2006.

"After 2 1/2 years, it's right to take a fresh look."

"We have a right to ask, 'What are the goals?'" said Rep. Walter B. Jones of North Carolina, one of the Republican sponsors of the measure.

"It's time to get serious about an exit strategy," said Rep. Neil Abercrombie of Hawaii, a Democratic sponsor.

Other sponsors of the resolution include Reps. Ron Paul (R-Texas), Martin T. Meehan (D-Mass.) and Lynn C. Woolsey (D-Petaluma).

Although the administration opposes any requirement for withdrawals or timetables, Jones, a conservative Republican, said the measure would provide a way for Americans to "debate and discuss" the issue.

"If we didn't do this today, we may be here in 10 years," Jones said.

Conway said a deadline would embolden Iraqi insurgents to continue daily attacks and bide their time until U.S. troops left.

end quotes

Conway is full of beans, and so is Connie Rice!

And get off of my emotions, here, General Conway, BECAUSE I WAS IN VIET NAM, and that war was as full of **** as you are!

YOU WANT THE SUPPORT OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE, GENERAL, THEN DON'T LIE TO THEM, AND DON'T TREAT THEM LIKE THEY ARE STUPID!

And if you want to kowtow and grovel before an incompetent Commander-in-chief, and lick his boots, that is your BID-NESS, and your right as an American citizen, to boot; BUT ...

As for me, I don't follow fools anywhere, and I don't like liars, and I don't like being lied to, and I don't support a war based on lies, and so ....

Or do you want me to make it simpler for you to understand?

[Livyjr]

June 17, 2005 latimes.com

"War Criticism and Concerns Both Growing - A bipartisan group of lawmakers wants to see a plan to withdraw troops from Iraq. A general cites the need to gain more public support."

By John Hendren and Cynthia H. Cho, Times Staff Writers

Conway said a deadline would embolden Iraqi insurgents to continue daily attacks and bide their time until U.S. troops left.

Here's the rest of that story .....

The insurgents "know our history, just like we study them," Conway said.

"And they see where we have withdrawn previously — in Vietnam, in Beirut, in Somalia."

"And nothing would make them happier, I suppose, than to think that there is a deadline out there."

Separately, House members Thursday debated a Democratic amendment to the 2006 defense spending measure that would require Bush to tell Congress within 30 days what his criteria would be for bringing troops home.

Unlike the resolution by Jones and others, the amendment — by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) — did not specify a timetable for withdrawal.

The White House said Bush shared the desire of many Americans to see U.S. military personnel return from Iraq as soon as possible, but rejected establishing a deadline for withdrawal.

"It would be absolutely the wrong message to send to set some sort of artificial timetable," White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan said.

"Our troops understand the importance of completing the mission."

McClellan said Bush would make the case for his Iraq policy in a series of public remarks in which he would focus on the importance of Iraq to the war on terrorism.

"He will be continuing to update the American people about the progress that we are making, the difficulties and dangers that remain, and the strategy we have for succeeding," McClellan said.

The communication campaign includes a speech June 28, the one-year anniversary of the transfer of sovereignty from the U.S.-led coalition to the Iraqi people.

In addition, the White House said Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim Jafari would meet with Bush at the White House next Friday.

The White House rejected requests by lawmakers and antiwar groups that Bush respond to the "Downing Street memo" and other prewar British government documents that foreshadowed U.S. military action against Iraq.

The Downing Street memo reported minutes of a meeting between British Prime Minister Tony Blair and his advisors indicating that the U.S. considered an attack on Iraq to be inevitable eight months before the war began.

More than 30 members of Congress attended a meeting Thursday called by Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, to discuss the British documents.

The meeting was not an official hearing of Conyers' committee and was held in a room in the basement of the Capitol.

John C. Bonifaz, one of four witnesses invited to meet with lawmakers and the cofounder of an organization called AfterDowningStreet.com, said that if the documents were proven to be true, the president may have violated a federal law against misleading Congress, and his actions would be grounds for impeachment.

"The American people deserve to know if the president lied," Bonifaz said.

Cindy Sheehan, whose son Casey was killed in action April 4, 2004, told lawmakers the Downing Street memo confirmed what she had already suspected:

"The leadership of this country rushed us into an illegal invasion of another sovereign country on prefabricated and cherry-picked intelligence."

Sheehan is the cofounder of Gold Star Families for Peace, an organization whose members have lost a relative in combat and who oppose the war.

Former U.S. Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, who traveled to Niger to investigate the alleged sale of processed uranium ore from the country to Iraq, and Ray McGovern, a former CIA official, also met with Conyers and other lawmakers.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) was one of more than 30 lawmakers who announced the formation of an "Out of Iraq" congressional caucus.

After the hearing, Conyers and other lawmakers went to Lafayette Park across from the White House for a rally organized by AfterDowningStreet.com.

Kevin Zeese, director of Democracy Rising, urged protesters to "give a shout out if you think we were misled."

He was greeted by cheers from the hundreds of demonstrators.

Some members of the crowd broke into chants of "Bring them home now!" and "End this war!" and carried banners calling for Bush's impeachment.

The rally brought out young and old, Washington residents and people who had traveled from across the country.

"Bush should be impeached for lying to Congress and then prosecuted for war crimes," said Carol Moore, a 57-year-old writer and resident of Washington.

"Impeached and prosecuted."

A small group of counter-protesters demanded support for U.S. troops.

Conyers and others sought to enter the White House gates to deliver petitions gathered by an anti-Bush group, MoveOn.Org, and others demanding that the president respond to the British documents.

The crowd chanted "Let Conyers in!" and the congressman eventually was allowed through the gates.

Analysts said the antiwar rhetoric on display Thursday marked a reversal from recent months.

The Iraqi election Jan. 30 boosted hopes for progress, experts said, but the situation has since deteriorated.

"Now you've got a combination of a lot of death, a lot of violence, things getting worse and no real convincing argument from the president as to why," said Michael O'Hanlon, a military analyst for the Brookings Institution, a Washington political think tank.

"It was almost unnatural that there was such a long hiatus in antiwar activity."

The antiwar movement has reappeared in part because lawmakers — especially Democrats — have avoided rhetoric that could be perceived as critical of troops but keep hearing differently from constituents, activists said.

"We see this as the beginning of the end," said Tom Andrews, a former Democratic representative from Maine who is executive director of the antiwar group Win Without War.

"It's the very beginning of a new wave of activism on this war."

"There's a real sense that something is beginning to move."

Times staff writers Mary Curtius, Tyler Marshall, Mark Mazzetti and Warren Vieth contributed to this report.

end quotes

Conway is full of beans, and so is Connie Rice!

And get off of my emotions, here, General Conway, BECAUSE I WAS IN VIET NAM, and that war was as full of **** as you are!

YOU WANT THE SUPPORT OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE, GENERAL, THEN DON'T LIE TO THEM, AND DON'T TREAT THEM LIKE THEY ARE STUPID!

And if you want to kowtow and grovel before an incompetent Commander-in-chief, and lick his boots, that is your BID-NESS, and your right as an American citizen, to boot; BUT ...

As for me, I don't follow fools anywhere, and I don't like liars, and I don't like being lied to, and I don't support a war based on lies, and so ....

Or do you want me to make it simpler for you to understand?

[Abu Beacon]

Here's the rest of that story .....

The insurgents "know our history, just like we study them," Conway said.

"And they see where we have withdrawn previously — in Vietnam, in Beirut, in Somalia."

"And nothing would make them happier, I suppose, than to think that there is a deadline out there."

I notice that in no place does Conway show any good reasons for us to stay in Iraq other than " saving face".

One very good way to do that is to change our commander in chief and our secretary of the Defense Dapt.

If Bush were to leave, voluntarily or otherwise, it would completely change the dynamics of this situation.

The new commander would take office with no negative history concerning this war and as president would be completely free to make any necessary changes in personnel and direction.

Since there is no real possibility that Bush would place the interests of America ahead of his personal ego, there is only one choice left.

There has to be a strong groundswell of public opinion to start impeachment proceedings against this pretender of a leader.

A.B.

[Livyjr]

And while George W. Bush and that crowd down there with him in the "ten mile square" of Washington, D.C., or "liar's town", as it is more commonly known, these days, anyway, keep feeding us a line of B*** S*** about how safe we are, here in OUR America ......

"Security Breach Could Expose 40M to Fraud"

By JOE BEL BRUNO, AP Business Writer

1 hour, 5 minutes ago

NEW YORK - A computer hacker may have accessed more than 40 million credit card accounts in what could be the largest in a series of recent security breaches involving consumer data, officials said.

MasterCard International Inc. announced Friday that the breach was traced to Atlanta-based CardSystems Solutions Inc., which processes credit card and other payments for banks and merchants.

All brands of credit cards could be affected.

The compromised data did not include addresses or Social Security numbers, said MasterCard spokeswoman Sharon Gamsin.

The data that may have been viewed — names, banks and account numbers — could be used to steal funds, but not identities.

Gamsin said she did not know how the virus-like computer script that captured customer data got into CardSystems' network, which MasterCard said was infiltrated by an "unauthorized individual."

Neither company would elaborate.

The FBI was investigating.

MasterCard said 14 million of its customers may have been exposed to fraud.

A spokeswoman for American Express said a small number of its cardholders were affected, but would not give an exact number.

Discover Financial Services Inc. wouldn't say whether its customers were affected.

Visa USA and a large issuer of cards, MBNA Corp., did not return calls for comment Friday.

The incident was the latest in a series of security lapses affecting consumer information.

The breach appears to be the largest yet involving financial data, said David Sobel, general counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center.

"The steady stream of these disclosures shows the pressing need for regulation of the industry both in terms of limitation in the amount of personal information that companies collect and also liability when these kinds of disclosures occur," he said.

Under federal law, credit card holders are liable for no more than $50 of unauthorized charges, and many card issuers will even waive the $50.

Other companies that have been hit by security lapses recently include Citigroup Inc., Bank of America Corp. and DSW Shoe Warehouse.

Federal lawmakers responded by drawing up legislation designed to better protect consumer privacy.

MasterCard announced the breach in a news release Friday, saying it was notifying its card-issuing banks of the problem.

CardSystems then released its own statement, saying it first learned of a potential breach on May 22.

The company said it was told by the FBI not to release any information to the public; its statement Friday had been vetted by the agency.

"We were absolutely blindsided" by MasterCard's announcement, CardSystems' chief financial officer, Michael A. Brady, told The Associated Press.

CardSystems, which has a processing center in Tucson, Ariz., has been in business for more than 15 years and handles transactions for more than 115,000 small to mid-sized businesses, according to the company's Web site.

The company says it processes transactions worth more than $15 billion annually.

Sobel said the fact that the latest breach involved a third party "indicates that this is a shadowy industry where the consumer never really knows who is going to be handling and using their personal information."

Earlier this month, Citigroup said UPS lost computer tapes with sensitive information from 3.9 million customers of CitiFinancial, which provides loans.

There have also been breaches involving other kinds of sensitive data.

ChoicePoint Inc. said in February that thieves using stolen identities had created 50 dummy businesses that pulled data including names, addresses and Social Security numbers on as many as 145,000 people.

In March, LexisNexis Inc. disclosed that hackers had commandeered a database and gained access to the personal files of as many as 32,000 people.

The company has since increased its estimate of the people affected to 310,000.

Information accessed included names, addresses and Social Security and driver's license numbers, but not credit history, medical records or financial information, corporate parent Reed Elsevier Group PLC said in a statement.
___

Associated Press writers Anick Jesdanun, Adam Geller, Harry Weber, Ted Bridis, Arthur Rotstein and Marcy Gordon contributed to this report.

[Livyjr]

There has to be a strong groundswell of public opinion to start impeachment proceedings against this pretender of a leader.

A.B.

A very astute observation about this Conway, Mr. A.B., very astute, indeed!

He needs a war, and he wants us to give him one, with no questions asked, and to make us do that, he uses OUR troops as an emotional goad!

"Oh, you got to do it for them, or everything that they did will be for nothing!"

Well, guess what, Conway, it has been, right from the start!

And now is the time to push for an impeachment of George W. Bush, and a complete housecleaning down in there in the "ten mile square", which is now known as "liar's town", here in OUR America.

[Livyjr]

I notice that in no place does Conway show any good reasons for us to stay in Iraq other than " saving face".

One very good way to do that is to change our commander in chief and our secretary of the Defense Dept.

If Bush were to leave, voluntarily or otherwise, it would completely change the dynamics of this situation.

The new commander would take office with no negative history concerning this war and as president would be completely free to make any necessary changes in personnel and direction.

A.B.

You know, Mr. A.B., you just have this kind of plain-speaking way about you that makes me wonder .....

What ever happened to the rest of us, here in OUR America, that we all, and especially the "leadership" (mocking tones are necessary when applying that word to anyone in one of those positions down in Washington, D.C., of course) don't know how to be and do the same thing!

CRAP .....

Is simply CRAP!

[jeffmoskin]

What ever happened to the rest of us, here in OUR America, that we all, and especially the "leadership" (mocking tones are necessary when applying that word to anyone in one of those positions down in Washington, D.C., of course) don't know how to be and do the same thing!

"A Republic, if you can keep it" - - - B. Franklin

This post has been edited by jeffmoskin: Jun 18 2005, 08:06 AM

[Livyjr]

"A Republic, if you can keep it"

- - -  B. Franklin

Uh, who?

Ben who?

He's passe, jeffmoskin!

A nobody!

An absolute NOBODY, and anybody that listens to an old geezer like him is nuts, I think I heard somebody say, anyway!

I think Donald Rumsfeld said that!

No, wait a minute, let's see ....

Hmmmm!

Or was it Dick Cheney?

No, Dick Cheney called him an *******, that's right!

It was Donald Rumsfeld that said he was passe!

He was trying to pass for an intellectual when he said it, too!

SO!

I would guess that he heard it then from either Condoleeza Rice, or Scottie "BOY" McClellan, who are intellectuals, and I know that because George W. Bush said so, or was that Connie Rice that said George W. Bush was an intellectual, but that can't be ....

George W. Bush had never heard of Ben Franklin, I think he said, or if he had, it meant nothing to him, and so .....

[Livyjr]

Uh, who?

Ben who?

He's passe, jeffmoskin!

A nobody!

An absolute NOBODY, and anybody that listens to an old geezer like him is nuts, I think I heard somebody say, anyway!

I think Donald Rumsfeld said that!

No, wait a minute, let's see ....

Hmmmm!

Or was it Dick Cheney?

No, Dick Cheney called him an *******, that's right!

It was Donald Rumsfeld that said he was passe!

He was trying to pass for an intellectual when he said it, too!

SO!

I would guess that he heard it then from either Condoleeza Rice, or Scottie "BOY" McClellan, who are intellectuals, and I know that because George W. Bush said so, or was that Connie Rice that said George W. Bush was an intellectual, but that can't be ....

George W. Bush had never heard of Ben Franklin, I think he said, or if he had, it meant nothing to him, and so .....

BUT .....

That's not going to stop him from picking a United States Supreme Court Justice, unless he gets impeached, of course, first ....

"Bush Weighs Possible High Court Vacancy"

By NANCY BENAC and DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writers

Sat Jun 18,12:20 PM ET

WASHINGTON - President Bush's best bets for filling a potential vacancy on the Supreme Court include six solidly conservative federal judges, each of whom has unique qualities that could make all the difference.

The president might choose, for example, a gregarious Texan with whom he might click personally.

Or a courtly Virginian who has backed Bush in the fight against terrorism.

Or a former Marine long viewed as a leading candidate to become the first Hispanic on the high court.

Speculation about who is on Bush's short list changes daily.

So does the betting on when — or even if — an opening might come.

But with 80-year-old Chief Justice William Rehnquist battling cancer and eight of the nine justices over age 65, the White House wants to be ready.

Bush has gone about winnowing his list with trademark secrecy.

That has not stopped interest groups and court watchers from feverishly ranking and re-ranking their lists of contenders.

Any self-respecting list, however, must factor in the all-important caveat that Bush has shown a great penchant for disregarding conventional wisdom in his appointments.

Consider the selection of Dick Cheney as vice president on Bush's ticket in 2000.

"The president goes with his gut," said Wendy Long of the Judicial Confirmation Network, which is rallying support for the White House's judicial nominees.

"He's not afraid to fight for someone he believes in if he thinks it's the right person."

The latest thinking focuses on six judges on federal appeals courts.

Not one is a household name, but all are very familiar to observers who have scoured their resumes, writings and public utterances for clues as to how they would rule if they were named to the Supreme Court.

One name that consistently pops up is J. Michael Luttig, a Texan who was named in 1991 by the first President Bush to the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, based in Richmond, Va.

Luttig, then 37, became the youngest federal appellate judge.

At 51, he still has a boyish look and playful manner that belie his judicial experience on what is considered the most conservative of the appeals courts.

"I think the president would hit it off with him," Long said.

"They are both from Texas, have a similar sense of humor and share the same judicial philosophy."

Luttig's father was murdered and his mother shot in a 1994 carjacking in their driveway.

The judge is known to be particularly tough on criminals, but he has rejected occasional requests that he withdraw from capital cases because of his father's death.

If Luttig were nominated to the high court, liberals would be sure to pounce on his role in helping Clarence Thomas win confirmation to the Supreme Court when Luttig worked in the first Bush Justice Department.

J. Harvie Wilkinson III is one of Luttig's colleagues on the 4th Circuit.

The 60-year-old also figures prominently in Supreme Court speculation, particularly if Bush were to fill a vacancy in the chief justice's seat with an outsider rather than elevating one of the associate justices, such as Thomas or Antonin Scalia.

"There's something about the aura of the chief justice that raises the threshold," said A.E. Dick Howard, a Supreme Court expert at the University of Virginia.

"I think the list gets narrowed if you're talking about a chief justice."

With his courtly Southern manner, Wilkinson has the gravitas and demeanor of a chief justice.

He is known for a somewhat more moderate strain of conservatism than some of the other judges on Bush's short list.

But strategists involved in the confirmation process say there is some concern that Wilkinson is vulnerable to charges he has engaged in judicial activism from the right — using the courts to rewrite laws to his liking rather than simply interpreting them.

In a commencement address at Duke University's law school last month, Wilkinson seemed to be trying to allay that concern.

Not all "judicial interventions" are bad, Wilkinson said, citing the historic Brown v. Board of Education ruling that integrated public schools as one example.

But he added: "What the past century suggests to me is that a call for the greater exercise of restraint on the part of the federal courts is not a rear-guard action but the vital vision for our future."

If Bush wants to make history by appointing the first Latino justice, Judge Emilio Garza of the 5th Circuit, based in New Orleans, is a leading candidate.

Nearly 15 years ago, the first President Bush gave serious thought to appointing Garza, now 57, to the high court.

Strategists say the historic nature of such an appointment could be an important factor when Bush has a number of solid conservatives to choose among.

Garza would be sure to be questioned closely about his writings suggesting that the Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion should be overturned.

Three others circulating as candidates for the court are Judges John Roberts of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit; Michael McConnell of the 10th Circuit; and Samuel Alito of the 3rd Circuit.

Roberts has been given more prominence of late.

Low-key, staunchly conservative and with a relatively short paper trail, Roberts is very much considered the safe, establishment candidate in Washington.

He has generally avoided weighing in on disputed social issues.

Abortion rights groups, however, have maintained that he tried during his days as a lawyer in the first Bush administration to overturn Roe v. Wade.

Others seen as plausible picks by the president, especially given his penchant for picking a wild card, include:

_former Solicitor General Theodore Olson.

_former Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson.

_Judge Edith Jones of the 5th Circuit.

_Judge Danny Boggs of the 6th Circuit.

_Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez.

_Lawyer Miguel Estrada, who withdrew his nomination to the D.C. Circuit when he ran into a Democratic filibuster.

Jay Sekulow, chief counsel for the conservative American Center for Law and Justice, said he is confident that Bush would nominate someone who shares the president's conservative judicial philosophy.

"I like the nominees the president has put on the appellate bench and that will translate well to his appointments to the Supreme Court," Sekulow said.

Liberal groups already are voicing displeasure with virtually all of the names in circulation.

"Regrettably, the most often mentioned names certainly seem to be individuals in the mode of Justices Thomas and Scalia," said Ralph Neas, who directs the liberal People for the American Way.

"If you look at the last four and half years, the president's always chosen confrontation over collaboration."

"I hope he surprises me."
___

On the Net:

Biographies of several potential candidates are available at http://wid.ap.org/scotus/list.html

Supreme Court: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/

[jeffmoskin]

Uh, who?

Ben who?

Wonder if Ben Franklin is related to Ben Laden?

Osama ben Franklin?

[Livyjr]

BUT .....

That's not going to stop him from picking a United States Supreme Court Justice, unless he gets impeached, of course, first ....

"Memos Show British Concern Over Iraq Plans"

By THOMAS WAGNER, Associated Press Writer

2 hours, 5 minutes ago

LONDON - When Prime Minister Tony Blair's chief foreign policy adviser dined with Condoleezza Rice six months after Sept. 11, the then-U.S. national security adviser didn't want to discuss Osama bin Laden or al-Qaida.

She wanted to talk about "regime change" in Iraq, setting the stage for the U.S.-led invasion more than a year later.

President Bush wanted Blair's support, but British officials worried the White House was rushing to war, according to a series of leaked secret Downing Street memos that have renewed questions and debate about Washington's motives for ousting Saddam Hussein.

In one of the memos, British Foreign Office political director Peter Ricketts openly asks whether the Bush administration had a clear and compelling military reason for war.

"U.S. scrambling to establish a link between Iraq and al-Qaida is so far frankly unconvincing," Ricketts says in the memo.

"For Iraq, 'regime change' does not stack up."

"It sounds like a grudge between Bush and Saddam."

The documents confirm Blair was genuinely concerned about Saddam's alleged weapons of mass destruction, but also indicate he was determined to go to war as America's top ally, even though his government thought a pre-emptive attack may be illegal under international law.

"The truth is that what has changed is not the pace of Saddam Hussein's WMD programs, but our tolerance of them post-11 September," said a typed copy of a March 22, 2002 memo obtained Thursday by The Associated Press and written to Foreign Secretary Jack Straw.

"But even the best survey of Iraq's WMD programs will not show much advance in recent years on the nuclear, missile or CW/BW (chemical or biological weapons) fronts: the programs are extremely worrying but have not, as far as we know, been stepped up."

Details from Rice's dinner conversation also are included in one of the secret memos from 2002, which reveal British concerns about both the invasion and poor postwar planning by the Bush administration, which critics say has allowed the Iraqi insurgency to rage.

The eight memos — all labeled "secret" or "confidential" — were first obtained by British reporter Michael Smith, who has written about them in The Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Times.

Smith told AP he protected the identity of the source he had obtained the documents from by typing copies of them on plain paper and destroying the originals.

The AP obtained copies of six of the memos (the other two have circulated widely).

A senior British official who reviewed the copies said their content appeared authentic.

He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the secret nature of the material.

The eight documents total 36 pages and range from 10-page and eight-page studies on military and legal options in Iraq, to brief memorandums from British officials and the minutes of a private meeting held by Blair and his top advisers.

Toby Dodge, an Iraq expert who teaches at Queen Mary College, University of London, said the documents confirmed what post-invasion investigations have found.

"The documents show what official inquiries in Britain already have, that the case of weapons of mass destruction was based on thin intelligence and was used to inflate the evidence to the level of mendacity," Dodge said.

"In going to war with Bush, Blair defended the special relationship between the two countries, like other British leaders have."

"But he knew he was taking a huge political risk at home."

"He knew the war's legality was questionable and its unpopularity was never in doubt."

Dodge said the memos also show Blair was aware of the postwar instability that was likely among Iraq's complex mix of Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds once Saddam was defeated.

The British documents confirm, as well, that "soon after 9/11 happened, the starting gun was fired for the invasion of Iraq," Dodge said.

Speculation about if and when that would happen ran throughout 2002.

On Jan. 29, Bush called Iraq, Iran and North Korea "an axis of evil."

U.S. newspapers began reporting soon afterward that a U.S.-led war with Iraq was possible.

On Oct. 16, the U.S. Congress voted to authorize Bush to go to war against Iraq.

On Feb. 5, 2003, then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell presented the Bush administration's case about Iraq's weapons to the U.N. Security Council.

On March 19-20, the U.S.-led invasion began.

Bush and Blair both have been criticized at home since their WMD claims about Iraq proved false.

But both have been re-elected, defending the conflict for removing a brutal dictator and promoting democracy in Iraq.

Both administrations have dismissed the memos as old news.

Details of the memos appeared in papers early last month but the news in Britain quickly turned to the election that returned Blair to power.

In the United States, however, details of the memos' contents reignited a firestorm, especially among Democratic critics of Bush.

It was in a March 14, 2002, memo that Blair's chief foreign policy adviser, David Manning, told the prime minister about the dinner he had just had with Rice in Washington.

"We spent a long time at dinner on Iraq," wrote Manning, who's now British ambassador to the United States.

Rice is now Bush's secretary of state.

"It is clear that Bush is grateful for your (Blair's) support and has registered that you are getting flak."

"I said that you would not budge in your support for regime change but you had to manage a press, a Parliament and a public opinion that was very different than anything in the States."

"And you would not budge either in your insistence that, if we pursued regime change, it must be very carefully done and produce the right result."

"Failure was not an option."

Manning said, "Condi's enthusiasm for regime change is undimmed."

But he also said there were signs of greater awareness of the practical difficulties and political risks.

Blair was to meet with Bush at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, on April 8, and Manning told his boss: "No doubt we need to keep a sense of perspective."

"But my talks with Condi convinced me that Bush wants to hear your views on Iraq before taking decisions."

"He also wants your support."

"He is still smarting from the comments by other European leaders on his Iraq policy."

A July 21 briefing paper given to officials preparing for a July 23 meeting with Blair says officials must "ensure that the benefits of action outweigh the risks."

"In particular we need to be sure that the outcome of the military action would match our objective... A postwar occupation of Iraq could lead to a protracted and costly nation-building exercise."

"As already made clear, the U.S. military plans are virtually silent on this point."

The British worried that, "Washington could look to us to share a disproportionate share of the burden."

"Further work is required to define more precisely the means by which the desired end state would be created, in particular what form of government might replace Saddam Hussein's regime and the time scale within which it would be possible to identify a successor."

In the March 22 memo from Foreign Office political director Ricketts to Foreign Secretary Straw, Ricketts outlined how to win public and parliamentary support for a war in Britain:

"[u]We have to be convincing that: the threat is so serious/imminent that it is worth sending our troops to die for; it is qualitatively different from the threat posed by other proliferators who are closer to achieving nuclear capability (including Iran)."

Blair's government has been criticized for releasing an intelligence dossier on Iraq before the war that warned Saddam could launch chemical or biological weapons on 45 minutes' notice.

On March 25 Straw wrote a memo to Blair, saying he would have a tough time convincing the governing Labour Party that a pre-emptive strike against Iraq was legal under international law.

"If 11 September had not happened, it is doubtful that the U.S. would now be considering military action against Iraq," Straw wrote.

"In addition, there has been no credible evidence to link Iraq with OBL (Osama bin Laden) and al-Qaida."

He also questioned stability in a post-Saddam Iraq: "We have also to answer the big question — what will this action achieve?"

"There seems to be a larger hole in this than on anything."
___

On the Net:

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/fcolegal020308.pdf

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/manning020314.pdf

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/meyer020318.pdf

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/ods020308.pdf

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/ricketts020322.pdf

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/straw020325.pdf

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1648758,00.html

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1593607,00.html

end quotes

Timeline?

Looks more like the anatomy of the BIGGEST CON JOB IN THE LAST CENTURY OF AMERICAN HISTORY, TO ME, ANYWAY!

[Livyjr]

Wonder if Ben Franklin is related to Ben Laden?

Osama ben Franklin?

How about Osama been gone, long time now, and if you think George W. Bush will ever catch him, well, .........

[Livyjr]

Timeline?

Looks more like the anatomy of the BIGGEST CON JOB IN THE LAST CENTURY OF AMERICAN HISTORY, TO ME, ANYWAY!

And somehow, these two articles just seem somehow connected, here, this thing about "growing up slow" .......

"Giant Extinct Birds Grew Up Slow"

Michael Schirber
LiveScience Staff Writer, LiveScience.com

Thu Jun 16, 9:55 AM ET

The moa, a large extinct bird from New Zealand, apparently had a decade-long adolescence.

This is unheard of in birds, but it may help explain how early hunters were able to wipe out the giant birds.

Moa, which have been extinct for several centuries, were ratites - a group of flightless birds that includes the ostrich, emu, cassowary, rhea, and kiwi.

The elephant bird of Madagascar is another ratite that has recently disappeared.

"Although moa had evolved from ancestral birds that could fly, they themselves were completely flightless and had actually lost all trace of their wings - not even retaining any vestigial wing bones," said Samuel Turvey of the Zoological Society of London.

There were 10 different moa species, ranging from turkey-size up to the giant Dinornis robustus, whose females weighed 530 pounds (240 kilograms) and stood 6 feet tall (2 meters) at the shoulder, but whose males were a third that size.

Most species of moa had stumpy leg bones, which would have made them very slow animals.

With no native land mammals on New Zealand, the moa filled in the niche of large herbivores like bison, rhinos, or giraffes - Turvey told LiveScience in an email message.

Recent research has shown that these lumbering giants took their time getting so big.

As reported in this week's issue of Nature, Turvey and his colleagues found cyclical growth marks - the equivalent of tree rings in animals - in the long bones from several moa specimens.

The marks, which tick off the changes in season, imply that the moa took nearly ten years to reach sexual maturity.

"It's remarkable because, although many other vertebrates (including humans) take several years to reach full size, all living birds become fully grown within a year of hatching - even the large living ratites such as ostriches, rhea and emu," Turvey said.

The rapid maturation of birds is thought to be because they need to start flying as soon as possible.

But the moa may have had the luxury of growing up at a leisurely pace, as they had few natural predators besides the giant Haast's eagle.

That all changed, however, when the first humans - the Maori - arrived in New Zealand about 700 years ago and began hunting the birds extensively - often only eating the best bits, like the 'drumsticks,' and leaving the rest.

"As moa took so long to grow up, they simply wouldn't have been able to replenish their populations rapidly enough to cope with this kind of hunting," Turvey said.

"They seem to have been wiped out almost instantaneously."

Visit http://LiveScience.com for more daily news, views and scientific inquiry with an original, provocative point of view. LiveScience reports amazing, real world breakthroughs, made simple and stimulating for people on the go. Check out our collection of Amazing Images, Image Galleries, Interactive Features, Trivia and more.