BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?

Subject: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Mr Red
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 05:13 AM

CNN are being cagey about the facts but they are trying to hint that a raid in Tikrit (who'd have guessed it?) was targeted on the man himself but no-one is confirming the idification.

This changes the game slightly.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 05:52 AM

If only!
Giok

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Little Robyn
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 06:18 AM

BBC World News (on NZ TV) are broadcasting right now that Saddam Hussein has been captured and Tony Blair has just confirmed it!!!
Yeah!!

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Little Robyn
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 06:32 AM

Now they're saying they've done DNA testing and it is the man himself!!!! It's not a double!!
(Don't ask me how they know - maybe they kept DNA samples from his sons bodies???)

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST,cookieless Nickp
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 06:35 AM

Hmm, yes the BBC is reporting it - complete with false beard (lookout Santa!) - but apparently proven by a DNA test.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 10:41 AM

What will the capture of Saddam Hussein change? It is an event with propaganda value for Bush/Blair, but it doesn't change the fact that Iraq is an ambivalent morass of chaos and skullduggery--or "quagmire" as we Yanks prefer to call it. Since Saddam and Iraq had nothing to do with the attacks on the US at home and abroad, it won't make any of us safer from terrorism (BTW, where is Osama bin Laden?) from Muslim extremists. And the "Road Map to Peace"? Well...

Nope, not much will change with this news. Except now the Iraqi people can be sure that it is the increasingly brutal Anglo American occupation authorities that they live in fear of, rather than Saddam and the Baathists.

I'm sure many Iraqis feel liberated. I'm sure many Iraqis feel the new boss is same as the old boss. Or as the cliche says "The more things change, the more they remain the same." Applicable here, I think.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 10:46 AM

Yup. Dubya will be sure to spin this as hard and as fast as he can for the next 11 months.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Bobert
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 10:48 AM

Well, danged....

Reckon Bush will dust off the "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" banner and dress up like a soldier and prance around and beat on his chest...

Not...

Nope, Bush's PR folks aren't going to fall in that trap again...

Actually, this weakens Bush's PR folks becuase it should put the focus back on Osoma bin Forgotten who is repromoted back to the position of Boogieman de' jour.

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Morticia
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 10:56 AM

It's being presented here as "an end to all that insurrection nonsense" too....can't they see that the strength of feeling in Iraq is not necessarily centred on Saddam and this really is unlikely to change anything?

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST,Blitzing Wolf
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 10:59 AM

It's a sad, sad day for the Bush and Blair hating denizens of Mudcatville; not to mention the courageous French, the noble Germans and the Saadam worshippers of Ramallah. Their brave hero of resistance to American hegemony, and the mass murderer of hundreds of thousands of innocent children, women and men, has been found cowering in a hole.

Now while Mudcatters weep, the people of Iraq breathe a great sigh of relief.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 11:00 AM

This is the chance for the DEMOCRATS to get Saddam to testify about how he couldn't have done it all without the FIRST BUSH'S HELP! Let him testify against the Republicans...!

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 11:01 AM

Forgive the pun after his bloodless shotless surrender was described as woman like, but: "this was the "MOTHER of all surrenders" ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST,Frank
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 11:02 AM

Does anyone remember Noriega? He was set up in power by the US administation at the time and then subsequently captured. A big deal was made over that. Saddam, same thing. Does this look like a pattern?

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Raedwulf
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 11:07 AM

I'm sure Bush will spin. Wouldn't you? Does that make this news anything other than an early seasonal gift for the whole world?

Saddam was & is a scumbag of the first water. The fact that he's been caught can only be good news for everyone, & for the peoples of Iraq in particular. The real test now will be how the US administration reacts. What now needs to happen is for them to avoid any excessive use of, or even overt display of, force; & to take this as opportunity to begin reducing their presence (which is not necessarily the same as leaving any earlier) ASAP.

They desperately need to reduce their profile in Iraq. The capture of Saddam ought to disembowel the resistance (which is not necessarily to say that it will). The US coalition now has a fabulous opportunity to improve their PR. And whilst we can all be cynical about PR & spin, it would be foolish to think that (if the opportunity is grasped) it will not make a profound difference to the present & future of Iraq.

Here's hoping, but forgive me if there's a tiny little cynical voice in the back of my mind demanding "Let's wait & see..."

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 11:13 AM

Guest, Blitzing Wolf, go find Landmine and salute Dubya all you want. The Noriega example is very accurate. They'll have to make room for a third in that prison wing, because Osama was ALSO in US pay for many years, fighting in Afghanistan against the Russians.

They never learn. . .

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 11:15 AM

Well now Wolfing Blitz, the Iraqis set up their own war crimes tribunal just a wee bit ago, and that august body is purportedly not controlled by the Anglo American occupation authorities. Any bets on the Americans handing Saddam over to his own people to be tried? No, I thought not.

Oh, and I'm sure you'd agree that the Iraqis are the ones who deserve all credit for the capture of Saddam, as they are the ones who led the Americans to him, and allowed him to be captured without a shot being fired.

Now if we could just get the Anglo American imperial regimes, which are responsible for millions of deaths of innocents around the world in the past 50 years, the world might truly become a safer, better place.

Let's see, there were those incinerations of nearly a million Tokyo civilians in WWII, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, three million Vietnamese dead...what heroes we Americans be.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Rapparee
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 11:21 AM

If they looked further in the hole where Saddam was taken they'd find Osama, too. That's 'cause "News of the World" said that they're married and even had photos of them, one with Saddam's head resting in Osama's lap and other of Saddam in his tutu.

By the way, the beard wasn't fake -- but Saddam HAS shaved.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Bobert
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 11:25 AM

Like I said above, I don't think they'll be any big splash from the Bush PR team because whatever they come up with will be undone by the report of the next Amrican casualty in Iraq... Saddam's capture doesn't de-quagmire Iraq...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Charley Noble
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:02 PM

Well, three cheers for his capture and now, I guess, the Bush Administration will have to conduct some kind of trial. I rather doubt that much will be made public except for the sentence. The trial itself will begin about October, the last month of the Bush Re-Election Campaign.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Thomas the Rhymer
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:05 PM

I'm glad they got him! Saddam is an asshole, and has done little or no peace work in his many years of power. He's been opportunistic in the extreme, he's worked for the worst of American interest in the past, and he is no friend of democracy.

That being said, the many thousands of civilians killed are not justified by the apprehension of a scared man hiding in a hole... and, this whole military approach to the 'world's' problems is the pinnical of hippocracy.

Aren't you even a little bit glad they got him Bobert? hmmmmmmmmmm?
ttr

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:11 PM

I have to admit, I'm in the "So What" category...

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:19 PM

I don't think gladness or happiness is an appropriate response to the capture of Saddam for me as an American, actually. Saddam was our Iraqi despot after all, and the Anglo American campaign to depose him from power has resulted in far too many civilian casualties over the past decade. The result of him being deposed is that we are now directly ruling that country with an occupying army and increasingly hostile iron fist, and we have allied ourselves with the worst despots in the region (ie the Saudis, Ariel Sharon, Musharraf in Pakistan, etc) to wage this highly problematic, morally repugnant, illegal war on the peoples of the Middle East.

That doesn't bring me a bit of joy, gladness, happiness or relief. Quite the opposite. Knowing the propaganda value of the sure to be very long, televised American tribunal against Sadaam and the other captured high ranking officials of his regime, sickens me. Why? Because I can't get the cost in human suffering over control of the oil resouces of the Middle East--what has driven this madness since the turn of the 20th century--out of my head.

What's another deposed and despised dictator in an endless line of them?

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Art Thieme
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:27 PM

Is the timing part of a conspiracy???

Sadam is found in the Shire hiding in a hobbit hole just as Grima Wormtongue will be found and rooted out this Wednesday when Return Of The King opens. The parallels are all too uncomfortable for this old folkie.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Greg F.
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:38 PM

So What? indeed.

No, most US voters don't remember Noriega. The majority of the few that do remember don't care. Ditto Pinochet, or the Contras, or Battista, or a thousand other examples...

The capture of Saddam won't "disembowel the resistance" any more than
getting rid of Dumbya would "disembowel" the Project for a New American Century neoconservative gang.

And that should be "What's another deposed and despised AMERICAN GOVERNMENT CREATED AND SUPPORTED dictator in an endless line of them?"

God Help America.

Best, Greg

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:43 PM

I think this is very nice for Saddam...just what the doctor ordered. After all, he has had to cower in one noisome hidey-hole after another for several months now, in daily fear of his life, eating sand and being assaulted by tiny insects, and getting really filthy!
These are not the living conditions appropriate for a famous man and a former head of state.

Now he will get a baath (sic), a shave, some clean clothes, 3 meals a day, a bed, and so on. Plus he gets to meet the World press again. Plus he gets to meet his worthy adversaries, the US military, and reminisce with them about what has become a legendary "search for the bad guy", even better than the old Pancho Villa one was. (Matter of fact, when Saddam is properly cleaned up he looks just like Pancho Villa.)

With any luck, Saddam will be brought stateside and get to meet Manuel Noriega, someone with whom he has a great deal in common. With any further luck, Saddam, like Manuel, will find Jesus and convert to Christianity and get saved!!!

This is a very good day for Saddam and for America.

It's also a very good day for Al Queda, given the fact that they never liked Saddam one bit, and now he is out of the way permanently, which means they can legitimately assume leadership in liberating Iraq from the foreign crusader forces, a campaign which is well under way, but still in its earlier stages.

This is all really cool, and I think we should join with Saddam, George Bush, Bin Laden, Tommy Franks, and all other involved parties and celebrate till sunup!

Drinks all around!!!

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:43 PM

Well, that's good.

I almost expected Bush to act as if he had captured Saddam personally, but he didn't. Good speech, short and to the point, and although my BS detector was on full, the needle didn't waver. He quite rightly indicated that this didn't really change much other than to assure the Iraqi people, both pro and con, that Saddam wouldn't be. A few additional comments about continuing the war on terrorism.

'Smatter, Blitzing Wolf? Mange medicine not working?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:43 PM

Art, your conspiracy theory is a bit of a stretch, especially considering that Saruman has been conveniently "disappeared" from "Return of the King"!

If there is any conspiracy here, I'd look to the highly publicized announcement of an "independent" Iraqi war crimes tribunal on Wednesday, and the capture of Saddam on Saturday.

BTW, are any of you aware that the Bush administration has begrudgingly agreed to allow former NATO commander and Democratic presidential candidate Wesley Clark to testify for the prosecution in the Kosovo war crimes tribunal--BUT! demanded that the UN allow the administration the right to edit the video and audio tapes of the sessions with Clark's testimony, before release to the public?

Howze ya like dem apples?

If the Bushites are so paranoid about losing the election next year that they are making these censorship demands of the UN to exert damage control over one of Bush's political opponents, just what lengths do you suppose the administration will go to in order to insure the American re-election script gets followed in a war crimes tribunal which will most certainly be held beyond the pale of international legal jurisdictions for such matters, hmmmmm?

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:46 PM

I would think one likely consequence of this is that now there'll be much less to stop the various anti-occupation Iraqis getting together to fight the occupying forces and their friends. Up until now the existence of Saddam must have made that kind of thing tricky.

While he was still "at liberty", it would have been hard building unity between people who loathed Saddam, people who supported him, and those Ba'athists who might have disliked him, but had a sort of loyalty to him. And there must have been a fear that, somehow, he might make a comeback, maybe with American backing. (After all, they backed Emperor Hirohito in Japan.)

But with Saddam out of the way...

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:58 PM

McGrath, the NYT reports did mention that there was a very good chance that there is an internal struggle for power going on within and among the insurgents, and that the fingering of Saddam by the Iraqis may well have been a strategic move to get him out of the way, so some other leader who could operate much more effectively to lead the rebellion against the occupation.

Saddam must have been an albatross around the neck of the leaders of the insurgency, whomever they are. That is my best wild ass guess as to why he was caught. He most certainly never would have been caught unless some Iraqi/Muslim insurgents hadn't wanted him caught. Now that the Americans have him, and will be spending their propaganda capital on his trial, there will be far fewer American troops crawling the countryside looking for him--they can literally crawl back to the palace in Baghdad and let Afghanistanization occur beyond the palace gates. It's not as if the American electorate gives a damn about Iraq or it's people, after all. We just want cheap gasoline, and for the terrorists not to kill us on our home turf. It's fine with us if they hit London or some far flung African or Middle East embassy. Just don't kill civilians on our soil, or jack the price of gasoline so high that it causes inflation to shoot up, and the inflated value of the home real estate market to collapse.

Especially not before the 2004 election.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Bill D
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:59 PM

lordy, what a bunch of blather from a bunch of (mostly) anonymous, opinionated know-it-alls...

I agree with Raedwulf, "let's wait and see"

it was better to capture him than let him run free...we captured him: now we need to see if we can get any useful info from him and devise some SANE plan for justice that will both satisfy the Iraqis and the world. That won't be easy, judging from what I read.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:03 PM

One thing to be grateful four is that they captured him. If they'd just killed him like his sons and gandson lots of people would never have believed it was him.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Bobert
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:04 PM

ttr:

I'm real glad they got the bum... Not only does it get one more badguy off the streets ('er out of the hole...) but it also will force Bush get back to the War on Terrorism....

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Ebbie
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:09 PM

Why do I suspect that there will be a window of opportunity for someone to dispatch the man?

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Peg
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:09 PM

sorry, but Grimal Wormtongue does not appear in Return of the King....

Oh and not to be nitpicky (Thomas!) but I have noticed that hardly anyone (not just on Mudcat) knows how to spell "hypocrisy." Spelling it with "acy" makes it look like it's somehow related to democracy...well, maybe it is. Can this really be one of those words people hear more than they see it in print?
You can keep your unique spelling of "pinnacle" though cuz it's kinda cute...

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:11 PM

Oh--the other likely conspiracy scenario I forgot to mention is how convenient the timing is of Saddam's capture vis a vis the reports emerging this week about Cheney's boys price gouging the American taxpayers, and cynically cutting corners on feeding and guarding the troops on the frontline.

BTW--why do you suppose American troops need private sector security guards, anyway?

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Peace
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:14 PM

Saddam Hussein is a piece of garbage. I hope someone does 'dispatch' the sonuvabitch. After the trial for war crimes.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Mr Red
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:26 PM

Well, I expected a splash when I tossed that pebble but even I am surprised.

Now a much smaller ripple but a good pedantic point - the capture was not shotless. A lot of weapons were seen and heard firing in typical Irqi rejoicing. They weren't firing at Allied forces, NOR hnded-over to those forces.

Discuss.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:27 PM

The convenient thing about the US regime changing every four years, is the US never has to be held accountable for their war crimes, for several reasons:

1. We have been the winners of the wars we fought in internationally, so we've controlled the war crimes tribunals.

2. There is a conspiracy among the thieves in the White House, ie that the first loyalty of government service at the highest levels of the executive and legislative branches, is loyalty to the status quo of our bureacratic rule as world superpower. This makes it impossible (as Robert MacNamara has proved again and again) for anyone to either admit that they committed war crimes, much less admitting fallibility on the part of the very fallible human men who have and will continue to ruin the world.

3. The men who engage in evil always believe that they are absolved of all guilt and shame for committing that evil, because they believe committing evil in the name of all that is good, is what is necessary for them to win. They rarely will make the public argument that they are morally right. They don't have to. They just have to assure their own people that committing evil is necessary for their side to win. The current Bush administration is quite masterful at this, because they are experts at appealing to the lowest instincts of human beings: fear, vengeance, racism, sexism, classism, religious bigotry, etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Art Thieme
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:30 PM

THIS JUST IN:

Scenario:

Saddam decides to go into the mud hut to take a shit. While in there, thirty-five cents falls out of his pocket and goes into the hole. "DAMN" says Hussein as he pulls a five dollar bill out of his pocket and tosses it down there before jumping into the hole himself. Just then soldiers bust in the door yelling, "That's Saddam. Get him out of that hole". Topside again, they ask him why he tossed the five dollars into the foul outhouse. His answer:
"You didn't think I was going down there for .35 cents did you???"

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Thomas the Rhymer
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:32 PM

Thanks for the reality check there peg... you are certainly on the ball this morning... I'm delerious with the flu, and my spelling is indeed worse than usual... hard to imagine, isn't it? :^)

On the other hand, dear and lovely peg... not even one word on content?

ttr

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Peace
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:35 PM

Art: If he really jumped into the shit, how could anyone have known it was him? The camouflage couldn't have been better--or more apt.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: DougR
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 01:36 PM

Ebbie: perhaps because you appear to me to be a natural born cynic.

This was exceptionally good news, and those of you who believe that it isn't are just not tuned in IMO.

Bush said the right things and he said them well. So did Tony Blair.
Neither of them claimed victory, and Bush particularly, stated that the violence will continue in Iraq. I think it is possible, though, that this may be the beginning of less violence.


Next, Osama!

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 02:05 PM

It is true, DougR, that many of us are not in tune with the Great Republican zeitgeist.

And thank god for that.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Gareth
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 02:11 PM

Well, on the asumption that you might trust the BBC to reprt acuratley, here are Blair's comments, Not the point on "the Iraqui People" Click 'Ere

Gareth

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: CarolC
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 02:16 PM

I agree with those who suggest that going after the puppets doesn't accomplish anything substantial or beneficial for humanity in the long run. In order for that to happen, it's the string-pullers who will have to be stopped.

Am I happy that Saddam has been captured? Maybe, if it really does make life better for the Iraqis.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 02:20 PM

"Grima Wormtongue does not appear in Return of the King...."

Well, I haven't seen the film, but he's in the book all right. I hope they haven't cut the Scouring of the Shire part out of the movie.

..........................

"I think it is possible, though, that this may be the beginning of less violence."

True enough, and let's hope that's true - but it is also possible that it will be the beginning of even greater violence.

Noone is suggesting that Saddam in his cellar was actually in charge of anything - the question is whether his capture is going to make attacks on the occupation forces and their allies less likely or more likely. I suspect that it could in fact even make it easier to set up some kind of umbrella "Iraqi Liberation Front".

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Ebbie
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 02:38 PM

DougR, I hope you are right. (But were you right about whether or not Bush would invade Iraq? hmmmm?)

If the capture of Saddam disheartens his loyalists enough so that they will swear off further resistance it will be a good thing. I doubt it, however. Have you read about the vengeance that is being wreaked by the various factions upon each other? Does anyone, including DougR, actually envision a happy ending to the carnage? It seems to me that this administration hasn't the slightest understanding of what they have unleashed.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 02:56 PM

Not only do they not have the slightest understanding of what they have unleashed, they also don't care what they have unleashed. All they care about it is money and power, not ending carnage--particularly the carnage of their own making that has left them standing knee deep in blood.

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: kendall
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 02:58 PM

In a word. CIVIL WAR. That's what has been unleashed. Precedent? Yugoslavia. Tito held all those ethnic gangs together with an iron fist, but when he died all hell broke loose, and the same thing is going to happen in Iraq. Another Kosovo.

I'm glad Saddam is gone, but I wonder how he raised that much beard in so short a time? Seriously, now Bush has to get on with the important work...FIND BIN LADEN. Would he dare to create another diversion to avoid his failure to find the real culprit?

Subject: RE: BS: Iraqnophobia - Sadman captured?
From: Peace
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 03:03 PM

The Bush administration has unleashed the dogs of war. There has seldom been a happy ending to war. Families weep for their lost ones, both soldier and civilian, and the vultures feast on the remains--feathered, political and corporate.