Life in OUR America, Volume 4, The Livyjr Files Options

[Snuffysmith]

I agree with you - don't shoot the messenger. But I find the statutory language curious. I'm bothered by the "or" - because it means the Admin can make some sort of argument here - What I find interesting is that they haven't classified their searches as "administrative" searches - those are a particular breed of cat - usually used by fire marshals during the course of a fire investigation. Those searches don't require a warrant. On the otherhand, those searches don't involve electronic eavesdropping.
I think more damning is the fact that the Administration has gone to Congress on occasions to request the very sort of authorization they claim they now have, and were rebuffed. Twice I believe. That goes to their own internal view that they didn't have the legal authority to do what they were doing.

[Snuffysmith]

THE MYSTERY OF THE TWO JAMES BAKER STATEMENTS

In a 2002 statement presented to the Senate Intelligence
Committee, James A. Baker of the Justice Department Office of
Intelligence Policy and Review questioned the constitutionality
and the necessity of a proposal by Senator Mike DeWine to lower
the legal threshold for domestic intelligence surveillance of
non-U.S. persons from "probable cause" to "reasonable
suspicion."

But for yet unknown reasons, Mr. Baker's remarkable statement is
found in two distinct versions.

"If we err in our analysis and courts were ultimately to find a
'reasonable suspicion' standard unconstitutional, we could
potentially put at risk ongoing investigations and
prosecutions," Mr. Baker said in the more expansive version of
his statement.

Moreover, "If the current standard has not posed an obstacle,
then there may be little to gain from the lower standard and,
as I previously stated, perhaps much to lose."

Yet even as Mr. Baker was expressing concerns about lowering the
probable cause threshold, the government was doing precisely
that in the NSA domestic surveillance activity.

Baker's testimony was highlighted last week by blogger Glenn
Greenwald and cited in the Washington Post and the New York
Times.

Strangely, however, the testimony in which Mr. Baker presented
those concerns cannot be found anywhere on the public record
except for the Federation of American Scientists web site:

http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2002_hr/073102baker.html

The testimony that is posted on the Senate Intelligence
Committee web site does not contain the three paragraphs in
which Mr. Baker questions the propriety of going beyond the
probable cause standard as proposed by Senator DeWine.

http://intelligence.senate.gov/0207hrg/020731/baker.pdf

Likewise, only the truncated version of Mr. Baker's testimony
was archived in the Nexis database and published by the
Government Printing Office in its printed hearing record.

"I am going to check into this," a Justice Department official
told Secrecy News on January 27. "Maybe we can clear this
mystery up."

No one has suggested that the FAS version of the Baker statement
is inauthentic.

In fact, an Associated Press story from the day of the hearing
(July 31, 2002) includes this sentence: "Baker said the Justice
Department is still reviewing that [DeWine] proposal and hasn't
decided whether such a change would be needed or if it would be
constitutional."

This sentence, by AP reporter Ken Guggenheim, does not
correspond to anything in the truncated Baker statement or in
his transcribed remarks at the hearing. But it does reflect
the contents of the full version of his statement that was
posted on the FAS web site, indicating that the AP had the same
document.

Citing Mr. Baker's testimony, Sen. Dianne Feinstein asked the
Senate Intelligence Committee to investigate the apparent
contradiction between his remarks and the conduct of the NSA
surveillance program.

"I hope that the Committee's review of this entire matter will
include inquiring whether the failure to brief the Committee as
required by law was compounded by testimony which was at best
misleading, and at worst, false," Sen. Feinstein wrote.

In a second letter, she noted the discrepancy between the Baker
testimony on the FAS web site and the official Committee
version. "I do not know why the two transcripts are different,
and I have asked my staff to investigate."

Both letters from Senator Feinstein are posted here:

http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2006_cr/feinstein012606.pdf


WHEN IS INTELLIGENCE CONSIDERED "COLLECTED"?

A layman might suppose that in the United States a telephone
conversation cannot be intercepted by an intelligence agency
such as the NSA except in compliance with the laws and
guidelines governing intelligence collection.

But it's more complicated than that because "interception" is
not considered "collection," according to a Department of
Defense regulation.

"Information shall be considered as 'collected' only when it has
been received for use by an employee of a DoD intelligence
component in the course of his official duties."

"Data acquired by electronic means is 'collected' only when it
has been processed into intelligible form."

See DoD 5240.1-R, "Procedures Governing the Activities of DoD
Intelligence Components that Affect U.S. Persons," December
1982, at paragraph C2.2.1:

http://www.fas.org/irp/doddir/dod/d5240_1_r.pdf

"This would suggest that automated speech recognition software,
creating records on US persons for purposes of pattern
recognition to detect sleeper cells, would not be prohibited,"
said John Pike of GlobalSecurity.org, who first called
attention to this provision.

In other words, defining "collection" in the peculiar way that
the DoD regulation does appears to permit the NSA to conduct
automated surveillance without violation of strictures on
unauthorized domestic collection.

"And by the time a US person became a 'person of interest' as a
result of this process, there would be reason to believe
[probable cause] they were an agent of a foreign power," he
proposed.

"So why did NSA not take this approach?" Mr. Pike asked. "Why
not just claim this, rather than making the rather more heroic
legal claims they are making?"

[Livyjr]

THE MYSTERY OF THE TWO JAMES BAKER STATEMENTS

In a 2002 statement presented to the Senate Intelligence Committee, James A. Baker of the Justice Department Office of Intelligence Policy and Review questioned the constitutionality and the necessity of a proposal by Senator Mike DeWine to lower the legal threshold for domestic intelligence surveillance of
non-U.S. persons from "probable cause" to "reasonable suspicion."

But for yet unknown reasons, Mr. Baker's remarkable statement is found in two distinct versions.

In my simple way of looking at life, this interchange between you and jeffmoskin on this law is quite interesting ....

And illuminating .....

You picked up on a critical word ....

And others read right over that ....

And that is the use of the word "OR" ....

After years of being a warrior, and studying weapons, I still find words to be the sharpest weapons of all ....

[Livyjr]

And while WHITE HOUSE LAWYERS parse sentences in their bid to create George W. Bush into a SULLA for OUR times, here in OUR America, old Mother Nature seems to have thoughts of her own about this NEW WORLD ORDER SULLA BUSH IRAQINAMICUS and Dick Cheney in the guise of Q. Caecilius Metellus Pius Scipio Nasica are trying to impose upon us, here in OUR own country, by force ....

"Hurricanes Shape New Natural Order"

By CAIN BURDEAU, Associated Press Writer

2 hours, 6 minutes ago

OVER THE NORTHERN GULF COAST - Last year's record hurricane season didn't just change life for humans.

It changed nature, too.

Everywhere scientists look, they see disrupted patterns in and along the Gulf of Mexico.

Coral reefs, flocks of sea birds, crab- and shrimp-filled meadows and dune-crowned beaches were wrapped up in — and altered by — the force of hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Dennis.

"Nothing's been like this," said Abby Sallenger, a U.S. Geological Survey oceanographer, during a recent flight over the northern Gulf Coast to study shoreline changes.

For him, the changes are mind-boggling: Some barrier islands are nearly gone; on others, beaches are scattered like bags of dropped flour.

Hurricanes have been kneading the Gulf Coast like putty for eons, carving out inlets and bays, creating beaches and altering plant and animal life — but up to now, the natural world has largely been able to rebound.

Trees, marine life and shoreline features tourists and anglers enjoyed in recent years were largely the same types as those 17th century buccaneers and explorers encountered.

But scientists say the future could be different.

Nature might not be able to rebound so quickly.

The reason: the human factor.

"Natural systems are resilient and bounce back," said Susan Cutter, a geographer with the University of South Carolina.

"The problem is when we try to control nature, rather than letting her do what she does."

The seas are rising, the planet is getting hotter and commercial and residential development is snowballing.

Add those factors to a predicted increase in nasty hurricanes and what results is a recipe for potentially serious natural degradation, some say.

"It may bring about a situation (in which) the change is so rapid, it's something that's very different from what the ecosystem experienced over the last three, four thousand years," said Kam-biu Liu, a Louisiana State University professor and hurricane paleoscientist.

"We may be losing part of our beaches, we may lose our coastal wetlands, and our coastal forests may change permanently to a different kind of ecosystem."

Between 2004 and 2005, "we've basically demolished our coastline from Galveston (Texas) to Panama City, Fla.," said Barry Keim, the state climatologist in Louisiana.

"It's getting to the point that we might have to rethink what our coastal map looks like."

The Gulf, scientists say, won't turn into an environmental wasteland, but it could be less rich in flora and fauna.

Surveys of the washed out Chandeleur Islands, an arc of barrier islands off the coast of Louisiana, found nesting grounds for brown pelicans, royal terns, sandwich terns and black skimmers gone.

"Hopefully the birds will be resilient enough to move to other areas," said Tom Hess, a biologist with the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.

"We will have to see."

Salt water spread by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita killed marsh grasses across the Louisiana coast, leaving little left to eat for Louisiana's most hunted bird — the duck.

"Most of the marsh where that salt water sat for a long time looks dead."

"It looks like it is does extremely late in the winter and you've had several extreme frosts," said Robert Helm, a state waterfowl biologist.

"Where we found birds, they seemed to be concentrated in the habitat that was not impacted by the storm."

Duck hunters ask themselves: If Louisiana's abundant wetlands keep getting knocked out, will the ducks head to greener fields?

"You don't go to the restaurant, find it empty, and hang around," said Charlie Smith, a duck hunter.

Katrina and Rita didn't only kill plants.

They annihilated more than 100 square miles of wetlands in Louisiana alone, scattering huge chunks of soft marshy earth.

"The hurricanes may have changed habitat in ways that we have not even begun to assess," said Harriet Perry, a fishery expert with the University of Southern Mississippi.

A lot of things are happening under the water, too.

With their towering waves — well over 50 feet high during Katrina — hurricanes move huge volumes of mud and sediment on the ocean bottom, burying clam and oyster beds and seagrass meadows where crabs, shrimps and fish hide and feed.

Can the sea plants spring back?

"It depends on the light penetration, how deep they are buried, and factors like that," said John Dindo, a marine scientist and assistant director of the Dauphin Island Sea Lab in Alabama.

Farther out, where the continental shelf drops off, the wild seas kicked up by the hurricanes damaged the Gulf's coral reefs.

After Rita's 30-plus-foot waves, surveys of the coral at the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary 100 miles off the coast of Louisiana and Texas showed damage to about 5 percent of the reef.

Brain and star coral was toppled and smashed into other coral heads.

About 3 feet of sand was dispersed on sand flats in the reef where trigger fish and queen conch burrow and nest.

Also, a large plume of contaminated runoff from the mainland's towns and industries befouled the reef for a couple of days, said G.P. Schmahl, the sanctuary's manager.

Coral reefs are resilient, for the most part, but like much else in nature along the Gulf Coast they could be devastated by an onslaught of powerful hurricanes and warming seas.

A coral reef near Jamaica, for example, was wiped out by Hurricane Allen in 1980, Schmahl said.

"If they're hit continually with a whole variety of stressors they may not be able to recover, and that's the big concern right now," he said.

Among fish, species shift locations when runoff from towns, septic systems and farms causes algae blooms or storms change salinity levels in coastal bays and channels.

Still, not all changes are detrimental: When Gulf commercial and recreational fishermen are knocked out of the water in storms, overfished species like the red snapper get some breathing room.

Nor are the effects confined to the water or the shoreline.

Go inland, and millions of trees — cypress, gum, pine, oak — were snapped like toothpicks.

Wild fires fueled by fallen timber break out and kill even more trees.

And plant diseases like citrus canker and soybean rust can be spread by hurricanes from one region to the next.

The Gulf is in the midst of flux — heavily developed, heavily fished and buffeted by climate change and storms.

It's becoming a perfect place for oceanographers, marine biologists, geologists and geographers to study, said Steven F. DiMarco, an ocean researcher Texas A&M University.

"I think," he said, "people are looking to the Gulf of Mexico ever more as a microcosm of the world."

[Livyjr]

And while WHITE HOUSE LAWYERS parse sentences in their bid to create George W. Bush into a SULLA for OUR times, here in OUR America, old Mother Nature seems to have thoughts of her own about this NEW WORLD ORDER SULLA BUSH IRAQINAMICUS and Dick Cheney in the guise of Q. Caecilius Metellus Pius Scipio Nasica are trying to impose upon us, here in OUR own country, by force ....

Dick Cheney in the guise of Q. Caecilius Metellus Pius Scipio Nasica, indeed ....

And SULLA BUSH IRAQINAMICUS .....

Looks like someone is not impressed by the togas with their purple trim .......

"Al-Zawahri Mocks Bush Over Terrorism War"

By NADIA ABOU EL-MAGD, Associated Press Writer

30 minutes ago

CAIRO, Egypt - In a new video aired Monday, al-Qaida's No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri mocked President Bush as a "failure" in the war on terror, called him a "butcher" for killing innocent Pakistanis in a miscarried airstrike and chastised the United States for rejecting Osama bin Laden's offer of a truce.

Al-Zawahri, wearing white robes and a white turban and speaking in a forceful and angry voice, also threatened a new attack in the United States — "God willing, on your own land."

The video, broadcast on Al-Jazeera TV a day before Bush delivers his State of the Union address, provided the first concrete evidence that al-Zawahri was still alive after the Jan. 13 airstrike in eastern Pakistan that targeted him but killed four other al-Qaida leaders and 13 villagers.

The message came on the heels of a Jan. 19 audiotape by bin Laden, the al-Qaida leader's first tape in more than a year.

Bin Laden said his followers were preparing an attack in the United States and offered the Americans a conditional truce, though he did not spell out terms.

A U.S. counterterrorism official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in compliance with office policy, said there is no reason to doubt the authenticity of the al-Zawahri video, which U.S. intelligence officials were analyzing.

The counterterrorism official noted the video was disseminated quickly, demonstrating al-Zawahri's ability to get his message out even faster than bin Laden.

That suggests the two are not hiding together and bin Laden may be in a more remote location than his deputy, the official said.

The Homeland Security Department had no immediate plans to raise the nation's terror threat levels because of the Zawahri tape.

"Not at this time," said spokesman Russ Knocke said.

U.S. officials had said after the bin Laden tape that no intelligence indicated an imminent al-Qaida attack.

On Monday, FBI Special Agent Richard Kolko said the bureau would ask agents around the country to review ongoing cases and tips in light of the al-Zawahri video, especially with two major events in the United States this week — the State of the Union in Washington and the Super Bowl in Detroit.

Al-Zawahri said in the video that he had a number of messages to give in the wake of the airstrike.

In one message, he invited Bush to convert to Islam.

"If you accept, you will become a brother in our faith and God will forgive you your sins," the Al-Jazeera news-reader quoted him as saying.

The invitation was not in the excerpts aired by the Arab satellite station.

He said the airstrike in Pakistan by an unmanned Predator craft targeted himself and four of his "brothers" in al-Qaida.

Instead, he said, it killed 18 civilians — "men, women, and children" — and he called Bush "the butcher of Washington."

"Bush, you are not only defeated and a liar, but, with God's help and might, a failure."

"You are a curse on your own nation and you have brought and will bring them only catastrophes and tragedies," he said.

"Bush, do you know where I am?"

"I am among the Muslim masses, enjoying God's blessing of their support, care, generosity and protection," al-Zawahri said.

He said he had a message "to the American people, who are drowning in illusions."

"I tell you that Bush and his gang are shedding your blood and wasting your money in failed adventures."

"The lion of Islam, Sheik Osama bin Laden, may God protect him, offered you a decent exit from your dilemma."

"But your leaders, who are keen to accumulate wealth, insist on throwing you into battle and killing your souls in Iraq and Afghanistan and — God willing — on your own land," he said.

The airstrike hit a building in the eastern Pakistan village of Damadola, where U.S. intelligence believed al-Zawahri had been attending an Islamic holiday dinner.

U.S. and Pakistani officials said the strike killed four al-Qaida leaders including a man believed to be al-Zawahri's son-in-law.

Intelligence officials said later they believe al-Zawahri sent his aides in his place to the dinner.

The deaths of the villagers in the strike sparked widespread anger in Pakistan.

Al-Zawahri warned Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf to stop cooperation with the United States, saying "your time of judgment is approaching."

In the video Monday, al-Zawahri was speaking in front of a black background.

No automatic weapons were visible, unlike past videos by the al-Qaida deputy in which a gun often appeared leaning next to him.

In the bottom left corner, the video had the logo in Arabic and English of Al-Sahab, an al-Qaida video production company that made some past videos by bin Laden and al-Zawahri.

Al-Jazeera aired two short excerpts from the video.

It was not immediately known how long the entire tape was.

During the year of silence from bin Laden, al-Zawahri issued several video and audiotapes, including one claiming al-Qaida's responsibility for the July 7 London bombings.

The last video from al-Zawahri came on Jan. 6, when he called the U.S. decision to withdraw some troops from Iraq a victory for the Islamic world.

Mark Ensalaco, an international terrorism expert at the University of Dayton, Ohio, said the tape's release may have been timed to come before Bush's State of Union address.

"Al-Qaida is very conscious of such things," he said.

"Having bin Laden and al-Zawahri appear in quick succession in these tapes underscores the fact that they're alive and well and still plotting attacks," he said.

___

Associated Press reporters Katherine Shrader and Mark Sherman in Washington contributed to this report.

end quotes

NO ....

Having bin Laden and al-Zawahri appear in quick succession shows that they are alive because George W. Bush is IMPOTENT .....

George W. Bush has been called out in public ....

And now, in the eyes of the watching, waiting world, George W. Bush has a bit of an image problem here ....

Because it is George who has been plotting all of the attacks lately ....

And he has failed in his objective ...

Which fact is being trumpeted to the world by one of his intended victims .....

"LOOK AT ME, WORLD!"

"GEORGE W. BUSH, THE MIGHTIEST MAN ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH, IN HIS OWN BOASTFUL WORDS, TRIED TO KILL ME, AND HE FAILED ..."

In a world of warriors, in a warrior culture, there is a lot of meaning in those words ....

Meaning that tosses a great big ball right in George W. Bush's corner ....

And by extension ...

America's too ....

Because if George W. Bush can't beat these guys in their own county, how will he stop them from getting here?

And if they know how weak George W. Bush really is, which is being demonstrated by al-Zawahri in that tape, that is an incentive for them to come here and try us on for size.

[Livyjr]

Ah, yes ...

SULLA BUSH IRAQINAMICUS ....

Like Rome before her, OUR America now needs a dictator like SULLA of Rome to put things back aright again ....

And that man is George W. Bush ....

A HERO .....

For us commoners to look up to ...

And fear ....

Because fear is what controls us ...

Outside of rewards, that is ...

And if you give a reward to everyone, well ..

They are no longer rewards, then ..

And so ..

Back to fear ....

The PROSCRIPTIONS .....

At least in SULLA's day ....

A list would be drawn up ....

And out the "murder gangs" would go ....

All of which is a matter of history ...

Which was well known by many, if not most, or all, of the delegates to the 1787 Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania for the purpose of creating a "more perfect union" BETWEEN the thirteen original "states" that formed the very backbone of OUR nation today ....

But 1787 was a long time ago, people tell me, and the times change ..

And we either change with them ...

Or get left by the wayside ..

And so ...

Here we are today ...

Wherever today might in fact be ....

And so .....

As I continue to study the history of Rome, and especially the last thirty years or so of its existence as a REPUBLIC, the years between SULLA's dictatorship and that of Julius Caesar, which marked the end of the REPUBLIC for Rome, I find that I could be "there" just as easily as "here", and I don't think an awful lot would be different, outside of the language, and mode of dress, and transportation, although since I walk a lot, myself, that certainly would be no different back then ....

And here, I am thinking in terms of human nature and psychology, especially among the RULING SET ....

Pompey the Great, Crassus and his two sons, Julius Caesar, Mark Antony .....

Mithridates, the Parthian King ....

Lepidus ...

Sertorius down in Spain ...

Wars ...

Intrigues ....

Plots ....

Riches ...

And MASSIVE EGOS .....

Bill Frist of the United States Senate could easily be the famed orator C. Lucilius Hirrus who Cicero spoke such effusive words of praise about ....

And John Roberts, the newest Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, why, he could be the living embodiment of Cicero today ....

And Samuel Alito as Cato ....

And Rick Santorum, the demogogic REPUBLICAN United States Senator from Pennsylvania ...

He, of course, would be none other than Clodius Pulcher, in all of his glory ....

And so ....

[Snuffysmith]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/HA31Ak01.html
No true Scotsman starts a war
By Spengler

Fight a dictatorship, and you must kill the regime; fight a democracy, and you must kill the people. Two years ago I called George W Bush a "tragic character" (George W Bush, tragic character, November 25, 2003) who "wants universal good, but will end up doing some terrible things". Now we have begun the third act of his tragedy, which shatters the delusions that led him to the edge of disaster. President Bush met Nemesis in the form of Hamas, whose election victory in Palestine last week makes clear that democracy can empower the war party as well as the peace party.

The president's first reaction on Thursday to Hamas' electoral triumph constituted, perhaps, the most addled response of any US leader in history to a portentous event. He alternately praised "the power of democracy", claiming that Palestinians had voted for better education and health care, but warned that demanding the destruction of one's negotiating partner while maintaining an armed wing does not bode well for peace talks.

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh on Saturday rejected as "blackmail" Washington's threats to stop financial aid to the Palestinian Authority. That neutralizes Washington's only means to influence the new Palestinian government, short of shooting. In fact, Hamas will get money from Iran, and blackmail the Saudis for more. The Israeli-Palestinian problem has become de facto a second front in Washington's confrontation with Tehran.

What will Washington do now? Professor Angelo Codevilla some years ago suggested "using military force to kill the regimes - the ruling classes - of countries that are in any way associated with terrorism", noting that "the dictatorial regimes of the Arab world consist of some 2,000 men". This sort of talk made Codevilla a pariah among the enlightened statesmen of the West, who expressed outrage over the Israelis' occasional assassinations of terrorist cadre. Now, instead of a few thousand deaths, we now will have a bloodbath. Washington, as I often have warned, [1] has created a monster. Wars long delayed usually are the most devastating (see In praise of premature war, October 19, 2004).

The American public appears more decided than the Bush administration. A January 27 poll taken by Bloomberg News and the Los Angeles Times found that 57% of Americans favor military action to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, against only 33% opposed. The same poll found that 53% of Americans did not think the Iraq war was worth the while. Seventy-six percent of Republicans supported the use of force, as well as 49% of Democrats, and Democratic politicians are rattling sabers as vigorously as the administration. European leaders, as I observed last week, already have endorsed the use of force should negotiations fail.

Bush now has to be extracted from the corner into which he painted himself: how will Washington respond to popular governments chosen in free and fair elections who wish to inflict violence upon the United States and its friends?

This paradox has made minor celebrities out of a pair of political-science professors, who came out with the right book at the right time (Electing to Fight; for a summary click here). Jack Mansfield and Ed Snyder distinguish between "mature democracies", which never, never start wars ("hardly ever", as the captain of the Pinafore sang), and "emerging democracies", which start them all the time, in fact far more frequently than do dictatorships. At a January 12 meeting of the Republican-leaning Cato Institute in Washington, Snyder introduced their tome as follows: [2]
President Bush says that America is safest when democracy is on the march ... Over the past year, we've seen plenty of elections in the Middle East. It's a big social-science experiment. The results are starting to come in. Most of them are pretty dismaying. The candidates who have been doing well in those elections are in favor of nuclear proliferation, in favor of pushing Israel into the sea, denying the Holocaust. They often have represented ethnic and sectarian communities rather than a broader public interest. In the Palestinian elections we're expecting the Hamas terrorist group to do well. In Afghanistan, terrorists and drug lords did well in the elections.
No true democracy starts a war, according to US academic dogma, and no professor seeking tenure flouts a dogma. This is a variant of the No True Scotsman Fallacy beloved of logicians:
Argument: "Ach! No Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge."
Reply: "But my uncle Angus likes sugar with his porridge."
Rebuttal: "Ah yes, but no true Scotsman puts sugar on his porridge."
"Emerging democracies", in the porridge of political scientists, are not "true democracies". As Mansfield told the Cato gathering:
Out-of-sequence, incomplete democratization often creates an enduring template for illiberal, populist politics - for example, the cycling between military dictatorship and illiberal democracy in Pakistan, the theocratic populism of Iran, and ethnic tyrannies of the majority in many transitional states.
Among the examples of wars launched by democracies are:
Serbia (1991): civil war
Iraq (2005): Kurdish and Shi'ite militias, threat of civil war
Bosnia (1995): war with Serbia
Ethiopia (1998): Eritrean war
India and Pakistan (1999): Kargil war
Burundi (1993): Hutu genocide against Tutsi
Iran (2005): election of Mahmud Ahmadinejad
Indonesia (1975): East Timor independence movement

I do not recommend the book; what is true in it is trivial, and what is not trivial is silly. Not the book, but the book's reception, is significant. Americans, contrary to their sanguinary image, do not like war, and need to talk themselves into it.

The silliest of all the Mansfield-Snyder arguments is the supposed cause of the United States' invasion of Mexico in 1846. In 1846 (70 years after the Declaration of Independence!) the US still counted as an "emerging democracy", in which political elites used the diversion of war to maintain power. If the United States in 1846 was not a "mature democracy", was it a "mature democracy" in 1898, when it declared war on Spain in a grab for colonies?

Mansfield and Snyder write of the 1846 war, "The Polk administration used expansionist themes to revive the connection between the Democratic Party and its Jacksonian popular base, which had been badly damaged during Martin van Buren's term as president." But in 1846, Americans knew better than that. As I observed on another occasion (Victor Davis Hanson goes to the seashore, January 4) the commanding Union general and later president Ulysses S Grant wrote, "The occupation, separation, and annexation [of Texas] were, from the inception of the movement to its final consummation, a conspiracy to acquire territory out of which slave states might be formed for the American Union." Grant was a moral and intellectual giant, underrated as a military leader (although Sir John Keegan helped set the record straight in The Mask of Command), who told his countrymen, "Nations, like individuals, are punished for their transgressions. We got our punishment in the most sanguinary and expensive war of modern times."

With all due respect, it is a disadvantage under present circumstances for the US president to be a Texan, and the secretary of state to be African-American. On three occasions, the United States has destroyed a significant part of an identifiable population. The first occasion was the reduction of its aboriginal population, often carried out in a brutal and dishonorable way. The second was the slaughter during the Civil War of nearly two-fifths of the military-age population of rebel provinces, the worst casualty toll in modern history. The third occasion was the incarceration of 10% of black American males, within the world's largest prison population of more than 2 million. The US solved the problem of criminal acts by a disgruntled minority by decimating the minority, putting one out of three young black American males in prison.

Killing off the southern rebels was an act of heroism; incarcerating young American blacks was an involuntary reflex of the law courts. But American southerners still mourn their dead, and turn away from the evil purposes of their ancestors. American blacks still weep for a lost generation. Both suffered unspeakably from the consequences of cultural (or perhaps moral) failure, and compensate with exaggerated hopes for redemption. Former president Jimmy Carter, who tried to love the Iranians who took hostage American diplomats, is the most extreme example. The trouble is that most peoples are not redeemed - not, in any event, before they are reduced by war. President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice are learning this the hard way.

Postscript
Of all the leaders of the world, the pope is most committed to the hope of redemption as a matter of metiere. For example, the Holy Father cannot say that there is no hope for Islamic reform. His predicament recalls the Israeli joke passed on by a correspondent in Boston, whose punch line states: "It is forbidden for a Jew to say, 'There is no hope'! 'No chance,' maybe."

In that spirit, Father Joseph Fessio, Pope Benedict XVI's student and longtime collaborator, now has qualified his earlier report of the pope's comments about Islamic reform at a seminar at Castelgandolfo last September. Fessio, as I reported on January 10 (When even the pope has to whisper) had told American radio interviewer Hugh Hewitt that Benedict had argued that the nature of Islamic revelation made Islamic reform virtually impossible. The transcript was posted on Hewitt's website, but drew little attention before our account appeared. The sudden notoriety of the pope's reported views on Islam drew into the fray commentators closer to the mainstream, including New York Sun columnist Daniel Pipes and Washington Times columnist Diana West, as well as a quasi-official Vatican blog, www.chiesa.com.

Now Fessio has made a formal recantation of his earlier report of the Castelgandolfo meeting, in a January 20 letter to the Washington Times, reposted on the www.chiesa.com site:
The most important clarification is that the Holy Father did not say, nor did I, that "Islam is incapable of reform" ... I made a serious error in precision when I said that the Koran "cannot be adapted or applied" and that there is "no possibility of adapting or interpreting it". This is certainly not what the Holy Father said. Of course the Koran can be and has been interpreted and applied ... The presentation and the discussion were in German, and the Holy Father was not speaking from a prepared text. My German is passable, but not entirely reliable. My later remarks in a live radio interview were extemporaneous. I think that I paraphrased the Holy Father with general accuracy [emphasis added], but my mentioning what he said at all was an indiscretion, and my impromptu paraphrase in another language should not be used for a careful exegesis of the mind of the Holy Father.

I would like to set the record straight and avoid unnecessary embarrassment to the Holy Father. The truth is always crucial, but especially so here where the stakes are so high. I am disconsolate that I have obscured the truth by my ambiguous remarks.
It is dangerous to speak about such things in German. As the Student told Mephisto in Part II of Goethe's Faust: "Im Deutschen luegt man, wenn man hoeflich ist" ("If you're polite in German, you're lying").

Of course Father Fessio paraphrased the pope correctly. The overwhelming majority of Muslim theologians agree with the pope that Koranic revelation is fundamentally different from Christian or Jewish revelation, such that Islam cannot be reformed in the same way that Christianity or Judaism can be reformed.

To paraphrase another recantation: Eppur non si muove. The seminar at Castelgandolfo examined with magisterial depth the same issue treated with academic glibness at the January 12 Cato Institute meeting. But the conclusion is the same. The elites of the West cannot sit like the Greek gods on Olympus during the Trojan War, making book and rigging the point spread for their favorites. The tragedy of Islam's confrontation with the West will unfold regardless, and wisdom lies in recognizing that we are in a tragedy, not a social-science experiment.

Notes
1. See They made a democracy and called it peace, March 8, 2005; The beast that slouches toward democracy, March 15, 2005; The Jihadis of Penzance, March 22, 2005; and Iran: The living fossils' vengeance, June 28, 2005.
2. Webcast available here.

(Copyright 2006 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact us for information on sales, syndication and republishing .)

[Livyjr]

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/HA31Ak01.html

"No true Scotsman starts a war"

By Spengler

To paraphrase another recantation: Eppur non si muove.

The seminar at Castelgandolfo examined with magisterial depth the same issue treated with academic glibness at the January 12 Cato Institute meeting.

But the conclusion is the same.

The elites of the West cannot sit like the Greek gods on Olympus during the Trojan War, making book and rigging the point spread for their favorites.

The tragedy of Islam's confrontation with the West will unfold regardless, and wisdom lies in recognizing that we are in a tragedy, not a social-science experiment.

Well, Snuffysmith, thought-provoking as always .....

But I wonder about this WE ....

As in WE are in a tragedy, rather than a social-science experiment .....

I don't know about this guy, but as for me, I am simply "IN LIFE" .....

And I don't define it any further than that ....

And so ....

I don't see this alleged "confrontation" of Islam with the west as anything to trouble myself about .....

Most especially since Islam has been co-existing with the "west" in one way or another for over 1,000 years now, and so ....

Look at the Ottoman Turks, for example .....

My take on all of this business today with Islam is that after Viet Nam, America needed a new enemy, an enemy more ubiquitous than a small country like Viet Nam, a harder-to-define enemy, so that concepts like winning and losing become much harder to define, which was a big problem for America in Viet Nam, where it definitely was not winning anything, but could not afford to have the world and the American people know that it was losing ......

Especially when it was so apparent to everyone ....

Through the media reports ....

And from accounts of returning soldiers ....

SO ...

After a careful search, Islam became the candidate ....

Because it met the criteria .....

And there really isn't that much left, outside of them ...

And the beauty of Islam as an enemy of America is that Islam exists where there is poverty, and so ...

It was perceived that Islam would be a weak enemy for America ....

And thus, one it might be able to beat .....

This thing of "better arms and armaments an army do make", you see ....

And who wanted and needed this new enemy for America was a diverse group ....

Those who were looking for someone to fight ...

And those who wanted to sell that crowd the arms and such to do the job with ...

And then those who wanted to bankroll the deal, for the profits on their capital that a war against a weak, far-flung enemy would provide them with ....

And there are probably more in there as well ...

But there is the catalyst, anyway ....

And so ....

[Snuffysmith]

The guts of his argument:


Fight a dictatorship, and you must kill the regime; fight a democracy, and you must kill the people.

Two years ago I called George W Bush a "tragic character" (George W Bush, tragic character, November 25, 2003) who "wants universal good, but will end up doing some terrible things".

Now we have begun the third act of his tragedy, which shatters the delusions that led him to the edge of disaster.

President Bush met Nemesis in the form of Hamas, whose election victory in Palestine last week makes clear that democracy can empower the war party as well as the peace party

[Snuffysmith]

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=8484

February 1, 2006
Why We Fight
Go see the movie
by Justin Raimondo
The theme of Edward Jarecki's thoughtful yet hard-hitting documentary, Why We Fight, is inspired by President Dwight Eisenhower's famous farewell speech, in which he warns against the rising danger of militarism as an economic system and a mindset:

"This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every state house, every office of the federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources, and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist."

We segue from old black-and-white footage of Ike inveighing against militarism to the present-day embodiment of precisely what he warned us against: Sen. John McCain burbling that the U.S. government "is the greatest force for good" and therefore "we must spread democracy and freedom throughout the world." One of the great benefits of this film is how badly McCain, who is getting ready to run for president, comes off in it: his hypocrisy in embracing Eisenhower's thesis, while bloviating about the need to intervene everywhere, exposes him for the massive fraud he is.

The scene shifts to John F. Kennedy declaring that we will "pay any price, bear any burden," and on to LBJ, Ronald Reagan, the Great Pantsdropper ("America is making a difference" by invading Kosovo), and our present Boy Emperor ("our cause is just"), all glorying in America's role as the imperial hegemon with a heart of gold, the global lawgiver and policeman all rolled into one – with neoconservative smarty-pants Bill Kristol averring that "we fight because it's necessary and it's right."

It isn't all talking pundit-heads, however: On Sept. 11, 2001, Wilton Sekzer was on an elevated subway train coming into downtown New York when the car made an abrupt turn around the bend and the passengers were suddenly confronted with the sight of the World Trade Center on fire. Sekzer, a retired NYPD officer, clearly remembers his first thoughts as if they were etched in fire on the inside of his brain, and he details his mental narrative here – and throughout the film – as a kind of personal link to the catalytic event that started the Iraq ball rolling. As that ball begins to careen out of control, there is a sadness in Sekzer's eyes, a pathos to his story, as he tells it, a look of bewilderment on his face – and a growing anger. He describes his anger at the sight of the burning building, and his hope – processed as certain knowledge – that his son, who worked in the Towers, had somehow gotten out of there.

Alas, that certainty soon crumbled, and Sekzer was swept up in his anger to demand vengeance – visited on the head of the nearest target: it didn't matter. Only revenge mattered.

Why We Fight utilizes an impressive array of analysts – I would say "talking heads," but the phrase doesn't do them justice – in order to make its case that a misguided war in Iraq was made possible by a systemic disorder of American democracy. Most striking is Chalmers Johnson, author of Blowback and The Sorrows of Empire, two of the most comprehensive recent studies of militarism and interventionism, whose analysis – framed in a historical context and informed by a healthy skepticism of ostensibly idealistic motives – trips off his lips with impressive facility.

9/11, says Johnson, "provided a group of people deeply committed to the expansion of the American Empire the opportunity to implement plans they had been laying since 1992." This was, in short, a "grand plan" for nothing less than global hegemony:

"We are the New Rome. That's their strategy: on 9/11, they began to implement it."

Kristol, who, along with Perle, here represents the neocons, would politely demur, protesting that what he wants is "benevolent world hegemony," as he called it in a famous essay. Former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz is shown making the case for war with Iraq, while Perle chimes in with a bold declaration that American foreign policy after 9/11 rightly shifted in "a radical direction." He clearly believes that isn't a bad development. Well, yes, says Kristol, but it would have happened even without 9/11 – and that really is a doubtful proposition. George W. Bush was elected to office promising a "humbler" foreign policy, and it is hard to imagine how he would have made the leap from humility to hubris quite so easily, if at all.

It was "a huge leap," as former Pentagon analyst and retired Air Force Col. Karen Kwiatkowski says in this film about the administration's post-9/11 focus on Iraq: "A manufactured leap, in order to implement a very calculated and pre-developed foreign policy."

This quantum leap – either backward or forward, according to your ideological predilections – into a new doctrine of preemption, which claims the "right" to attack any nation, anywhere, at any time, and for any reason. It is enthusiastically endorsed by McCain, Kristol, and Perle, and symbolically celebrated – or, rather, dramatized – by a duo of Air Force pilots who personally participated in the first bombing strike of "Operation Iraqi Freedom" and breathlessly relate how great it was and how privileged they felt to be participants in this historic event, "the liberation of a people," as one of them solemnly intones. We are then jerked abruptly back to reality by the sardonic Professor Johnson, who reminds us that the Bush Doctrine is not really new: it is, instead, "an extreme statement of what has been in the works for a long time" – really, he says, since World War II.

One of the best features of this narrative is that it gives the viewer a sense of historical perspective without indulging in boring lectures, and does it, furthermore, in a visually dramatic manner. Joseph Cirincione, a foreign policy analyst at the Carnegie Endowment, takes us back to the Eisenhower era, when, he says, the American Empire had come to maturity and the military-industrial complex began to dominate our political culture and our foreign policy. Gore Vidal contributes his perspective on this time – when he was a young man – by pointing out that Eisenhower opposed the decision to nuke Hiroshima and Nagasaki, even though 99.9 percent of the military fighting in the Pacific at the time were for it because they thought half a million of them would have to die unless Japan was forced to surrender in this way. What they didn't know, says Vidal, is that Japan had been trying desperately to surrender, but we – i.e., the malevolent pygmy Harry Truman – wouldn't let them. We did it to "show off," says Vidal, but "Eisenhower hated the bombs."

We weren't just "showing off" for the sake of beating our chest, but to show the Soviet Union we meant business. The Cold War era meant that the militarization of American society occasioned by World War II was to be made permanent: there would be no real demobilization. American forces, as the war ended, were everywhere: the idea of "benevolent global hegemony" was in the air, waiting to be formalized into a policy paper or a State of the Union address.

The question "What are we fighting for?" is asked throughout this film, and the answer, by the end, is all too horrifically apparent, but on the way there we are treated to an entire panoply of American opinion. A trip to Karen Kwiatkowski's home town, way out in the boonies somewhere – red-state territory for sure – turns up a surprising variety of answers, ranging from "Freedom!" to "Hell if I know." Why We Fight, as Karen points out, is the title of a famous series of World War II propaganda films directed by Frank Capra that sought to mobilize the country, and there was a consensus back then that the war was not only necessary but also just. Not today, however, and Jarecki's film weaves together a tapestry of voices, ranging from shrill neocons like Perle to author Gwynne Dyer, who avers that we're fighting to make the point that "the U.S. is the country that must be obeyed." "The question is," says Sen. McCain, "where is the line between being a force for good, and imperialism?" I suppose it is useless to point out to the senator that virtually all imperialists see themselves as a force for "good."

Why We Fight is not a film in the Michael Moore mode of in-your-face propaganda, but is all the more effective in that it lets all these voices speak for themselves. Juxtaposed next to Professor Johnson's thoughtful analyses, Bill Kristol comes off as rather facile, and the snickering Perle, one of those historical actors who seems typecast in his role, comes across as frankly villainous.

Jarecki takes another step back and we are suddenly looking at this whole process of fighting overseas crusades from an historical perspective: a Cold War propaganda film informs us that our homes could be destroyed – "Right now. Right now!" – and that the only answer is "strength," while a muscular arm helpfully demonstrates this simple principle. We are back to Eisenhower's 1950s as his present-day descendants – John S. D. Eisenhower and Susan Eisenhower – explain how the flow of cash into "defense" industries lays the groundwork for the military-industrial complex. We get a few more lines from Eisenhower's farewell address, as we segue into shots of an air show where militarism and entertainment meet and merge. Then a few statistics: the U.S. spends more on the military than all other categories, and, furthermore, spends more than the combined total of the top 10 other military budgets in the world. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is shown saying that the numbers have reached a level where they are almost meaningless, and one tends to agree, albeit for different reasons.

At this point, Sen. McCain pops up again, insisting that Eisenhower was right: "His prediction came true."

Well, uh, yes – thanks, in no small part, to warmongers like Mad Dog McCain.

As one of the most belligerent of the neocons' allies in Congress, McCain has never opposed U.S. military intervention anywhere in the world for as long as he's held public office. Here is a man for whom "boots on the ground" is the answer to practically every foreign problem confronting the U.S. From Kosovo to Iraq to wherever the next stop is in the neocons' mad war dance, McCain can be counted on to beat the drums for war, which is why his 2000 presidential campaign had the full backing of Kristol and the more radical neocons. And now he has the utter gall to solemnly proclaim himself an Eisenhower Republican and an avowed enemy of the military-industrial complex.

A key sub-theme of Why We Fight is the business of militarism, and this is dramatized in a series of interviews, shots of military trade shows, and a visit to Raytheon. We're given the public relations spiel by a Raytheon spokeswoman, but reality breaks in when an ordinary worker says: "I'd really rather be helping Santa make toys."

Speaking of Santa Claus, this is precisely the role the U.S. government plays in relation to military contractors. These guys are the active element that keeps the military-industrial complex (MIC) running like a well-oiled treadmill; and, since Eisenhower's day, the MIC has become an enormous edifice, one that relentlessly and quite profitably perpetuates itself almost like an living organism. The trick in the militarism business, we are told by a Defense Department analyst, is to over-promise the benefits and lowball the costs of any new defense system – and then spread around the campaign money to as many congressional districts as possible. Chalmers Johnson notes that the B-2 bomber has parts made in so many different congressional districts, if you discontinued it you would have even the most liberal members screaming bloody murder. An economic-political force is built up by the MIC that makes the momentum of militarism practically unstoppable.

The rush for contracts, the interaction of government and industry, the "revolving door" – Sen. McCain decries all this as "corruption," yet fails to point out that it is part and parcel of the policy of aggression for which he is one of the primary spokesmen. There is much focus on Halliburton and Brown and Root, two of the main pillars that hold up the infrastructure of Empire. Perle says targeting Halliburton is "outrageous." Why, he says, it is ridiculous to believe that the vice president would pick up the phone and use his office to influence the choice of military contractors. Chalmers Johnson retorts that everyone knows who the vice president is and knows of his relation to Halliburton. It is here pointed out that the entire idea of "contracting out" support services and other functions of the military to private contractors came up during Cheney's tenure as Secretary of Defense. "We elected a government contractor as vice president," says one analyst. McCain agrees that "it looks bad." "Overcharging is bad." He is then told that Cheney is on the phone, and, like a chipmunk staring into the headlights, lamely excuses himself from the interview. This is bound to get a horse laugh out of the audience, as well as contribute to the vice president's growing reputation as the most despised public servant since Rasputin.

Kwiatkowski – a libertarian advocate of small government – makes the point that, when it comes to making the decision to go to war in Iraq, we commoners employ a different cost-benefit analysis than, say, a member of Congress. A decision to go to war may cost an ordinary mother or father their son or daughter, while a vote against war may cost a politician plenty of bigtime campaign contributions and office perks. Charles Lewis of the Center for Public Integrity follows this up with an astute observation: the financial and political elites have become essentially the same thing. While Karen comes from the libertarian "Right," and Lewis comes, from all indications, from the "Left," their analysis of how this works converges rather neatly. A government elite is using the U.S. military to empower and enrich itself at everyone else's expense – and it isn't pretty, as the Iraq war is showing us every day.

The film deals with the military in two separate narrative threads: one involving two Air Force "Top Gun" types, who fit the Hollywood-ish image of a glamorous militarism – smiling optimists, handsome, and very presentable – and who nonetheless protest that "we're normal people just like everyone else." On the other end of the spectrum, we have some clueless dork, a low-level recruit from, it looks like, New York City and environs, a cipher with no direction, no ambitions, a blank slate waiting to be written on. His mommy died, and now he needs a new parental figure: he finds it in the military. "You fixed up my life real good," he tells the recruiter.

The film begins to focus on Iraq when it comes to the subject of lying in wartime: we are shown old footage of LBJ lying through his gritted teeth about the so-called Gulf of Tonkin incident. Sekzer says: "You never thought anyone would lie. The bugle calls, you answer." Then he found out about the lie behind the Gulf of Tonkin. It wasn't necessary to lie, he says. But of course it was – otherwise, Congress and/or the American people wouldn't have bought into that war. That's why they bother to lie – as they have in every war for the last 50 years, as Lewis points out. Periodic orgies of military intervention, Lewis says, are "a ritual that we have been seeing for decades." It's basically "economic colonialism." We just "go in and have free trade and free markets. What's really going on is we want our companies to get rich in your countries."

Just as the invasion of Iraq never had anything to do with "democracy," so, too, "free trade" – and free markets – are just the ideological window-dressing for a policy of imperialistic mercantilism, in which the military forces of the most powerful nation on earth have essentially become tools of certain corporate and political interests.

Another key point made in this film is the essential role played by the pro-war thinktanks, such as the Project for a New American Century, founded by Kristol. Kwiatkowski tells the story of how the Office of Special Plans brought in people from a "very narrow range of think tanks" to think up talking points justifying the rush to war. "Things were strange from the very beginning." Yes, and the lies were thick and fast in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, a process Kwiatkowski has done much to shine the spotlight on. Kristol downplays this factor – protesting that we shouldn't "overemphasize" the role played by PNAC in lying us into war. Dwyer makes the point that, while Eisenhower named three components of the MIC – Congress, the defense industry, and the military itself – a fourth one has lately come to be important, and perhaps even decisive: the pro-war thinktanks, the nonprofit repositories of the War Party's ample largess.

I didn't intend to do a blow-by-blow analysis of this incisive and very well-made documentary, and I won't go into any more detail – I don't want to ruin it for you. I just want to add one thing, however, and that is an answer to Perle, who, at one point in the movie, snarks:

"One of the sillier ideas is that American policy has been hijacked and once they're out of there we can go back to the way it was before. It's not going to happen because we've changed – as a people."

If I were Perle, I wouldn't count my chickens before they hatch. What is increasingly clear to many Americans is (1) our foreign policy has been hijacked, and (2) that the hijackers are on their way out of power, and, perhaps, on their way to a jail cell (at least in Scooter Libby's case). What's more, this film – and the popular anti-interventionist sentiment it will inform and reinforce – is part of a nationwide reaction against militarism that is just beginning to gather momentum. If we take this country back from the gang that lied us into war – and is even now scheming to gin up more wars – then Why We Fight will have played what may turn out to be a catalytic part by making the victory of Eisenhowerism over neoconservatism possible.