Lieberman, Blair and Iain Dale
Joe Lieberman is an odd fish, indeed - ostensibly, even proudly a Democrat, yet signed up to the increasingly beleagured and unpopular neocon agenda. Rejected by his party, yet elected by his public, and now recommended by Iain Dale. Iain's support for the Iraq war is well known, and he's entitled to his position (I believe that people are entitled to their position if they can spell, punctuate and construct coherent sentences, incidentally - criteria that exclude the President of the United States, who's entitled to nothing more than my boot up his harris should I ever catch him bending over. I digress). Having read the article and from what I've seen I totally disagree with Iain, and I suspect that more people are moving towards my position than his (70% of the US population for a start). Considering he's likely to be standing for Parliament and I'm extremely unlikely ever to ('Vote Tom for sensible public transport, a moral foreign policy and the nailing up of David Blunkett by the thumbs') is a bit strange - you'd have thought he might want a few votes, for which a mainstream rather than an extreme position could be an advantage. He'll certainly find it hard using Lieberman's arguments to a cynical British audience, as they're identical to Tony Blair's, and we know Britain is fed up with him.
On the other side of the fence, it's quite a shock to find who our fellow travellers are these days - sold-out, sold-up Blairite Peter Hain, Republican Senator Chuck Hagel - not the sort you'd expect to see joining us great unwashed out on the streets in the 'Bush #1 Terrorist' shirts. However, when you survey the wreckage of the neo-con agenda - still an array of familiar faces from the American 'Enterprise' Institute, Dick Cheney, Nick Cohen, Christopher Hitchens and of course the Hornswoggler-In-Chief, Tony Blair, still gurning and spewing over the TV and papers, it becomes clearer. Many of these are of course 7/10ths frothingly insane, so why is a decentish, affable Tory like Iain still urging us to back them? It's hard to draw much connection between any of them and traditional British conservatism, which is a carefully crafted ploy to play chess by keeping all the pieces exactly where they are, not a revolutionary movement that intends to throw all the pieces in the air and work out what to do after they land.
To have any chance at understanding, we need to don our long rubber gloves and waders and see what Joe's been writing. Oh dear. From the first line it appears that we're deep in the ideological territory where an undefined 'win' in Iraq is linked closely, and with no evidence, to the security of the USA. He goes on to portray Iraq in the same glib, unreal language as Tony Blair - moderates versus extremists, without specifying precisely whom he considers to be on each side. The hallmarks of extreme neocon rational detachment are still strongly visible - Iraq and 9/11 are linked, mysterious 'thems' are conjured out of thin air, but never expounded upon. Rhetorical flourish replaces analysis (sound familiar?) and the lack of evidence is overwhelming.
More pertinently, he talks about 'surrendering' Iraq, which will come as a surprise to anyone who might have thought that handing over Iraqi sovereignty in a carefully stage-managed ceremony 2.5 years ago actually meant anything. Clearly, in Lieberman's mind, the US is holding Iraq as a bulwark against extremism, which isn't quite what we were originally supposed to be doing there (disarming Saddam, if you believed Tony Blair). You can't hold a sovereign nation except by force of arms and military occupation, which is so clearly the neo-con strategy that they aren't even hiding it these days.
We then move on to illogicalities - Saddam was a 'danger' (not to the US, he wasn't), a 'barrier' to a democratic Middle East - so was the Shah, so are President Mubarrak, General Musharraf, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia/any other strong man with a secret police concerned about the voice on the street. If a democratic Middle East is the goal, let's judge them on results. Can we hear the Voice of the People? Nope, a deathly silence, punctuated only by the glad cries of the arms companies as we give them the green light to supply our friendly dictators. What would be the result of democracy spreading across the Middle East at this point - moderation or extremism (as defined, or rather as not defined, by Lieberman)? Joe doesn't say, perhaps for obvious reasons - the result of the Iraqi invasion on the 2005 Iranian elections is clear and unequivocal.
Perhaps it's Joe's views on politicians that caught Iain's eye? I hope not:
There was I thinking they were elected to represent. Many are clearly capable of neither, so what the hell were they elected for?
We then turn to a telling part which indicates quite clearly that Lieberman has a good grasp of the stick. At the wrong end.
Whisper it - al Qaeda isn't going to be a popular mass movement unless we help it. No one likes a fundamentalist, particularly if you're a powerful, proud tribe used to getting your own way and doing things your way. The arrival of bearded foreign fanatics with wild-eyed talk of jihad and martyrdom and the profound importance of murdering as many Shias as possible is at odds with this. It's the least surprising thing in the world if Sunni tribes decide that the al-Qaeda boys are better off out of their fight. It would, of course, take a powerful common enemy to bring such people together, a powerful enemy like, oo, a foreign military occupation. That would do it, so what Joe's unwittingly advocating here is pulling out and letting the Iraqis dictate their own future, which will be without al Qaeda.
[My goodness, this is like reading raw tripe. The things I do to prove that neocons are irrational, insane and dangerously deluded fools]
The tough questions posed by this highly partisan interviewer have the same tangible existence as those elusive WMDs.
We then come to predictions of dire catastrophe if we pull out. Well, there will be a dire catastrophe whatever we do, for the simple reason that there's a dire catastrophe now, which we started; the people who started it are still running it and there'll be a dire catastrophe as long as they're running it. It's a damn good idea to change horses in midstream if the horse you're on is galloping towards the waterfall and not listening to you shouting 'WHOAAH'. Lieberman's predictions are of course rubbish - al Qaeda will not take over in Anbar for the reasons outlined above - without a common enemy the locals will boot them out. Iran will not take over in the south unless we make it easy for them - President Ahmedinejad is in a poor political position at the moment, although we can easily improve that by attacking him. As for the prospect that the people who attacked the US on 9/11 'achieve a victory' if we leave? They're dead, or in Afghanistan or Pakistan, and in a sense have been winning on points since 2002 without actually having to do much work. Mind you, if the mooted Taliban offensive in the spring proves hard to contain, then fingers should be pointed at people like Joe Lieberman who actively supported pulling US troops out of Afghanistan into the Baghdad meatgrinder...
Quite, Joe. Anything else on your mind?
Except for the Taliban, apparently. Logical stuff, Joe. Clearly the first thing people do on getting the ruins of their country back is to jump into imaginary aircraft or ships and head for the USA. This sets up the interesting position that while there's one 'terrorist' left in Iraq (which there will be as long as the US is there) you can't pull out. Catch 22, unless of course you actually want to stay there permanently.
What's noticeable is the degree to which Joe's rhetoric closely resembles Tony Blair - this isn't so surprising, since they've both made the same journey from Clinton-acolyte to fully paid-up swivel eyed neocon Bush fancier. Check this out:
Remind you of anyone?
Tony Blair, 24/9/2002
Uncanny. And both wrong, if you trust our Armed Forces (which surely any good Tory would?). It's difficult to see why Iran would help the Mahdi Army with IEDs (since the Mahdi Army specialise in death squads, defence of Shia areas and internal Iraqi politics) and impossible to see them helping the Sunni insurgency, which contains elements (Baathists and Sunni fundamentalists) who are profoundly opposed to Iranian influence. That leaves the Shia militia in the south, who are sporadically attacking not the Americans, but the British, or precisely the people who are emphatically saying that no proof has come to light that the Iranians are supplying the weapons. Game, set and match, I think - the same people are giving us the same spiel we got four years ago, and it doesn't add up any more now than it did then. This is a propaganda piece from the US far-right, brought to you steaming and hot from the rear end of the real anti-Americans. The words 'Wall Street Journal' at the bottom of the article rather give the game away.
Ladies and gentlemen - I give you Joe Lieberman - incoherent, illogical, ill-educated and not someone worthy of any British bloggers recommendation. Time for the adults to take over, I think.
The only unequivocally
The only unequivocally Iranian funded militia in Iraq is the Badr Brigade. They were based in Iran until the US invasion, when they provided 'strategic assistance' to American troops in securing parts of southern Iraq. There have been significant tensions since - they've been involved in the torturing and disappearence of Sunni Muslims and others, including gay men. They're all over the Interior Ministry and embryonic Iraqi 'Army.' Of course, they're role in sectarian atrocities is unmentionable. They're our 'Allies.' Game set and match to Iran, I suspect.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badr_Organization
Liebermans aparent dichotomy
Liebermans aparent dichotomy is quite easy to explain. Lieberman is a Zionist. The position of the fence he chooses to sit on will be determined by whatever helps the Zionist cause. There is no 'conflict' when this is factored in. The 'division' between R & D is an illusion. If one believes otherwise, then its clear they have a poor and shallow knowledge of politics.
Researchers of the NWO/illuminati/masons have long known about the fake partizanship, not just in the US but elsewhere, like in the UK for example. This is not to say EVERYONE is involved in the illusion. Most are just dupes, but the sham of political splits have become even more widely accepted/publicised by respected mainstream analysts in recent years. E.g. John Perkins, Scott Ritter and John Pilger for instance.
R or D, the global slaugter and economic enslavement is always the same!
----
Re: Apparent (some say obvious) Shia-US copoeration. This has in recent years, fuelled speculation of a deeply intriguing secret Iranian/Israeli alliance, which is rapidly becoming a major focus of my political analysis.
and now recommended by Iain
and now recommended by Iain Dale
Is he same person that also recommends that twat Guido?
So much for judgement eh?
The US/UK invasion of Iraq
The US/UK invasion of Iraq caused the collapse of the Iraqi state, Iraq is now a failed state. There are no institutions that link the State (in the Green Zone) with the Iraqi people in the rest of the country (the Red Zone). About the only link between the two zones is the US military (which has no way of engaging with the Iraqi people except waving rifles at them). Into the vacuum left by the Hobbesian nightmare of a failed state have poured criminal gangs, militia, groups providing retail basic security and maybe some terrorists. People support local militia if it protects them from the neighbouring militia. It is pointless to destroy one militia if the US (or the Iraq government) cannot then put something in its place.
It is the inability of the US to reconstruct the basic institutions of a State that lies at the heart of the Iraq problem. Unfortunately the US administration appears not to recognise that this is the problem, let alone have a plan for dealing with it.
A "win" or "victory" cannot be achieved by the equivalent of putting a flag on top of the Reichstag or making the Emperor capitulate by dropping an atomic bomb or two. There are no centralised power centres that can be captured and made to surrender. Power has been fragmented to hundreds of groups. If one is removed, another will take its place unless people believe that they will become part of a state that will protect and support them, and at present they simply don't believe that this could happen.
Talk about a "win" or "victory" is frightening because it leaves undefined what this victory would look like and is unrelated to a realistic view of the present situation. It raises the spectre of a never-ending war: continuous escalations in search of a Reichstag falg moment that will never happen.
If, as I believe, the
If, as I believe, the overriding rationale for the presence of the US/UK military in Iraqis to secure continued access to/control of the largest remaining undeveloped reserves of what is left of the worlds oil endowment, then all the rhetoric about 'the war on terror' and 'helping the Iraqi people' etc is a smokescreen - pure and simple.
Sure, the preferred outcome would be a client state dependent upon the West for its 'security' and continued existence (a la Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States for example where it has worked remarlably well for 50+ years) - and to act as a bulwark against an historically intransigent and hostile Iran. But if that can't be achieved - and by now it's clear that it cannot - then the next best thing is to ensure that a non-dependant hostile government does not emerge. If that means fomenting civil war, then so be it. Seems to me that a massive military presence can and will still be maintained to secure that primary objective, regardless.
Sabretache Blog
Joe Liebermann is just a
Joe Liebermann is just a common or garden American Jewish neo-con, towing the latest AIPAC Likudnik line.
As for the charismatically named Iain Dale, there are a lot more neo-cons luking around the Tory stables than they're sometimes given credit for. (They just keep relatively quiet about it). Apart from the totally out-of-the-closet Michael Gove, there's Ed Vaizey, William Hague, Liam Fox (God he's squirming when it comes to criticizing Nu Lab's Iraq policy), and, despite being firmly in the closet, probably Cameron himself and Letwin (ex-Peterhouse/Cowling).
Is there really that much of a puzzle about this sudden emergence of international neo-connery? Its the old class war in a new form. The new ruling class, in a global economy, do not have allegiances to their specific country but to their class, who cover the world. None have much time for or allegiance to the ordinary members of the societies of their own country. They have a basic contempt for them - with the enormous wealth divide that globalisation has brought about - and see them as things to be used and abused rather than respected and referred to.
Actually, only approximately
Actually, only approximately 35% of Joe Lieberman's democratic constituency voted for him. His campaign (after his primary loss) was run by Karl Rove. He defeated Ned Lamont because republicans (led by Karl and his people) were instructed to vote for him. This is why he is so loyal to Bush/Blair.
That's how Cynthia McKinnie
That's how Cynthia McKinnie lost her Congressional seat (for the second time) too. A concerted campaign to get Republican voters to go for her establishment compliant Democratic rival - and using all the dirty tricks in the book. And another of the very few honest US politicians is effectively silenced.
There is a series of videos on UTube worthy of a look to understand how this is done.
American Blackout pt 1/8
American Blackout pt 2/8
American Blackout pt 3/8
American Blackout pt 4/8
American Blackout pt 5/8
American Blackout pt 6/8
American Blackout pt 7/8
American Blackout pt 8/8
Sabretache Blog
It's ThatLiamFox
It's ThatLiamFox blokeAgain.
What you should know about Foxy baby:
Post title:
LiamFox Watching Iran. Well,
URL:
http://www.blairwatch.co.uk/node/1541
BIBI Watch Woke up to a
BIBI Watch
Woke up to a powerful personality on the Today Programme, took a minute to be pretty sure who it was.. English perfect, delivery impressive.
Steamroller at work promulgating a Simple Message -- nukes in a thousand days-- 1938--- annihilation---genocide--- holocaust denial--- Trial for a War Criminal--an extreme violent acopalyptic sect (the Muslim relgion, that ?),and so on.
Carolyn Quinn tried some counter-attack, but was steam-rollered.
Even a far-better briefed opponent/journalist would have had a difficult time, as the half-dozen corrective points take time to develop, a far harder task than just repeating a 'Simple' argument.
Hi Killer, I missed your post here at BW on CFI, (Conservative Friends of Israel) .
Interesting.
Anyone would think Ahmadinejihad had invaded a country, causing 655,000+ deaths.
What Joe Lieberman says is
What Joe Lieberman says is sadly what many Americans believe. The nucleus of the piece Tom references is, quote:
'If we pull out and essentially surrender to the extremists and terrorists, they are naturally going to follow us right back to our shores . . . and then the same group of people who attacked us on 9/11, they achieve a victory'
The 'fight them there instead of here' and '9/11 link' has been repeated so often, it is now indelibly ingrained in the American psyche. It gives America carte blanche to bomb anywhere in the world.
I have heard even Democrat senators talk about the Ukraine as 'the front line of our national security'.
Senator Lugar called Putin's gas shut off 'an attack on NATO' and said 'an attack using energy should be treated the same way as a land attack by conventional military forces.'
America seriously believes its borders are in other people's countries - a kind of projected paranoia. It is very hard to shake this thinking.
DIY IEDs from the Yorkshire
DIY IEDs from the Yorkshire Ranter
No pun intended, but t'ain't rocket science.
Yawn . The propaganda goes on and on, and on. And on.
Still, one good side to it. The propagandists love to pile it on, one allegation after another --- and since as time rolls by, we identify more lies, just one of them serves to undermine a speaker's credibility.
Yup frog. Somebody must of
Yup frog.
Somebody must of told em (possibly Tone) that if you tell a lie enough it magically transforms into a truth.
Somebody gave em the wrong advice (see above) though didn't they?
"America seriously believes
"America seriously believes its borders are in other people's countries - a kind of projected paranoia."
Excellent observation, copydude - never thought of it in that way before. Kinda makes you wonder if the east coast of America actually runs out as far as Thurso and Dover and all points inbetween!
How fortuitous, the captcha
How fortuitous, the captcha validation is 'cund' -because Joe and Iain are complete cunds, yay, free speech. Sam Seder of air america has got holy joe's number and suffice to say if you support joe it pretty well defines you as human waste, which perhaps can stand as the definition of 'cund'.
tenpercent.wordpress.com
WTF ! well, well, well,
WTF ! well, well, well, well !
I live in Normandy , a hundred clicks south of Cherbourg .
And I distinctly heard the Chief Rabbi of the UK repeating the BIBI Netanyahu propaganda 'War on Iran' message on the BBC Radio4 Today prog this morning .
"annihilation ....IRAN .... genocide .... nukes.... 1938 ! "
You can all check at davide simonetti's site " the netherworld" in sidebar to see that he has critically reviewed this subject -- "wiping off the map".
Years ago, one of Sir Jonathan Sachs' predecessors , maybe something slightly different like Chairman of the Board of Deputies , made it quite clear that there was a difference between Judaism and Zionism. (I think it was 1980 , but will have to fire up my old computer to find it. )
TIMES HAVE CHANGED . NOW, the Zionist lobby has drowned out the voices of sensible jewish people.
Considering the number of BW members, about 5, and the rest of us, I'm surprised nobody has brought this up.
Tomorrow is Holocaust Remembrance Day.
For me, ALL genocides need remembrance.
PS On a rare visit to a friend with a TV, I witnessed a 94 yr old cobbler in Paris. He is one of the "JUST ", he saved a jewish kid of 6 from the French police. " We were far more scared of the French police than the German soldiers."
The old guy said " I did my duty, why all the fuss .... "
That brought a lump to my throat. A tear not far away.
PPS So I'm probably not 'antisemitic' , you may agree ? But I DO find it criminal that the Holocaust is being used by the State of Israel as an excuse for just anything.
PPPS the demonisation of Ahmadinejihad has been well exposed on the net. Davide is one witness.
PPPPS Check out "Direland" with google to see if I'm a politically naive frog. I look at all the evidence I can get, and have no illusions about that man in Iran.
What bugs me is the propaganda campaign, which is aimed not at him, but at US .
Dale is rabidly anti-Arab.
Dale is rabidly anti-Arab. At the time of the last smash and (failed) grab raid by the Israelis into Lebanon, he posted comments about "ragheads" that should have earned him the 0400 kicking down of his door by the boys in fetish gear and with itchy trigger fingers. To my mind it was a clear incitement to racial hatred and I have not visited his site since. Dale is NOT a suitable person to be elected to Parliament.
I don't think that any
I don't think that any rational person would disagree with you. We must remain humane though: I suspect that Dale heroically survived a rabies infection, the after-effects of which would haunt mankind for the remainder of his life.