BS: Obama caught in blatant lying

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: pdq
Date: 04 Jan 10 - 11:55 AM

"A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take everything you have."             ~   Barry Goldwater

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Art Thieme
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 11:35 PM

This thread is f......g depressing.

Bottom line: We blew it again! The single payer idea is dead.

None of what any of you have said here matters at all. What matters is how what is done plays out and impacts on the lives of real PEOPLE!!!

In the meantime, we who partake in the healthcare system of the USA, as it is, and as whatever it morphs into, will live or die with the consequences as the morons and the geniuses fight it out.

Art

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 10:50 PM

Meaning?

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Riginslinger
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 10:33 PM

"What do you think of the Dalai Lama's regime and those that preceded it in Tibet?"

                  One only has to look at the way religion is practiced in Tibet.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: CarolC
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 10:31 PM

It wasn't the lack of a reformation that ended the democratic government in Iran. It was a CIA backed coup. There is no way for us to know if the dictatorial regimes that are being propped up by the US in countries like Egypt and Saudi Arabia would have been able to do what they've done without the help of the US. I don't think we can say whether or not Muslim countries would have the tendency you describe, Peter, in the absence of Western interference, because they have been subject to Western interference since the 1800s. We can't say we know what they would be like without such interference because there is no way to know this.

By the way, Islam has gone through a reformation period, but as with Christianity in the US, and Judaism in Israel, there are extremists who want things to move in a more fundamentalist direction.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 10:03 PM

Maybe you're right about that, Peter.

What do you think of the Dalai Lama's regime and those that preceded it in Tibet?

I think that many other types of regimes besides religious ones have proven equally incapable of admitting mistakes because their legitimacy likewise was unchallengeable by definition. Certainly this has been the case with pretty well every dictatorship that ever existed, whether or not it functioned under the definition of a "religious" administration. As for communism as practiced under the Soviets or the Maoists, I think it IS a state religion, albeit one that does not admit to a "God", but one that instead erects human and political gods in the place of spiritual ones.

As for non-dictators who must face a periodic vote which may vote them out of office...they very rarely admit their mistakes either, but usually go on believing they were right even after they've been turfed out of office. ;-) The saving grace is...they CAN be turfed out of office.

As you say "the only truly healthy political systems are ones that allow for mistaken regimes to be dethroned peacefully".

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Peter T.
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 09:52 PM

Like I said, the Egyptian Brotherhood.   

Muslim countries are so varied, it is hard to judge. Still, they do seem to play out the truth that without a Reformation that separates church from state, authoritarianism buttressed by religion eventually takes over (in spite of the hopes of liberal Muslims, a number of whom I have had dealings with over the years, and had long discussions about the benignness of various historic regimes and interpretations of Koranic teachings; and, now that I tot them up, all of them have turned bitter later in life or have left their hopes and in many cases their families and friends behind them). Karl Popper appears to have been right: the only truly healthy political systems are ones that allow for mistaken regimes to be dethroned peacefully, and religious regimes are unable to admit mistakes because their legitimacy is unchallengeable by definition.   

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: CarolC
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 09:19 PM

Thanks, LH.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 09:06 PM

Eric Margolis also talks about the revolutionary movements that have long fought the dictatorship in Egypt and been ruthlessly suppressed. I recommend that you check out his books too, Carol.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: CarolC
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 08:44 PM

The US government props up many dictatorial regimes around the world as a part of US imperialism. The governments of Saudi Arabia and Egypt being two of them. A lot of the animus of Muslims around the world toward the US is a response to that.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 08:14 PM

Your points are well taken, Peter. I was indeed summing things up in a very general and sketchy sense in my last post. For some interesting reading which will flesh out much better what I am talking about, there are a couple of books out by Eric Margolis which go into this subject in great depth.

I think there is a genuine desire on the part of the majority of Muslim populations almost everywhere to modernize, democratize, improve public education, and get rid of various oppressive local rulers and also get rid of foreign intervention in their countries. To do that is way easier said than done, needless to say. It seems to be the impossible dream. In Afghanistan, for example, the Mujahedin who defeated the Soviets were divided into at least 7 different factions, and they all soon began fighting with each other, to the deep disillusionment of many of the fighters who had gone there from across the Muslim world to liberate Afghanistan from the Soviets. Many of those fighters gave up on Afghanistan in disgust at that point and went instead to fight in Kashmir against the Indian Army. Of those who stayed in Afghanistan, the Taliban faction eventually won out over most of the others (although they never defeated the "northern alliance" in the Northeast of the country). The Taliban could not have succeeded in this, had they not been greatly assisted by Pakistan intelligence and military services who sponsored them. The Pakistanis did that for their own particular reasons (mostly in regards to opposing Russian ambitions in the region), but not for the purpose of promoting Islamic fundamentalism. It was a very complicated situation. The Taliban, for purely religious reasons, decided to shut down the entire opium trade in Aghanistan and reduced it to a trickle (other than in the "northern alliance" part, where it flourished)...they were congratulated for this by the USA which considered them an ally at that time, and they (the Taliban) were given considerable financial assistance by the USA. Only later when they decided to award the contract to build a major oil and gas pipeline (from the Caspian area through Afghanistan to Pakistan) to a Latin American Company instead of to a USA-based company did the USA decide that the Taliban were "bad guys". That was when plans began to be formulated to attack Afghanistan, because they had not cooperated with the USA's energy plans in that area. That was considerably prior to 911, but 911 provided the perfect and timely excuse to launch the attack.

The man, by the way, who advised the Taliban to give that contract to the Latin American firm was..........Osama Bin Laden. He was seen as a hero in Afghanistan, because of the very active part he had taken in fighting the Soviets in the 80s, and it was his influence there that caused them to reject the American offer to build the pipeline in favor of a Latin American offer to do the same.

That is why the USA went after the Taliban, in my opinion. They were not doing business in a way that pleased the USA. That's also why the USA decided to put Saddam out of business, by the way. Nothing speaks louder than who gets energy contracts when it comes to American wars.

***

The Saudi royal family (which is a very LARGE extended family with God knows how many princes...you can have a lot of sons when you have a great many wives...) is in it for their own gain. Due to that, they play ball with the USA. At the same time they also fund Islamic extremism....as long as it takes effect outside their own borders...preferably as far away as possible from Saudi Arabia. Margolis talks about this a fair bit in his books. It seems that the Saudi royal family likes to play both ends against the middle, promoting instability in other places, enforcing strict obedience at home....posing as the "good ally" to the USA, but posing as the "guardian of the faith" by being the home of Islam's holiest shrines in Mecca and Medina.

It's a pretty devious approach to politics, isn't it?

Anyway have a look at Margolis' books. They're very interesting, and not hard to find at larger bookstores.

Anything I've said here is a mere fragment of what you'll find in those books.

I don't talk about any of this because I think what I say will make a darned bit of difference. ;-) I just talk about it, because I'm interested in it. Period.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Peter T.
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 05:46 PM

While I agree with some of this, I think "western dominated proxy governments" skates over a whole mass of internal complexities -- is Saudi Arabia western dominated? -- unless the whole toxic mess of modernisation is to be labelled "western" (for which good arguments could be made I suppose), and the Saudis are at the heart of things (funding Wahabist sects among other things).   Oil and the Israeli-Palestinian issue are in here too.   I think it could be argued that many of the nationalist Muslim groups may be interested in some kinds of "modernization" -- or repelled by them -- but "democratization" may be just another word for getting rid of the tyrants at the top (cf. Iran's original revolution and where it is now).   I think it is a bit much to say that the large majority of Muslim fighters are (i) nationalistic; (ii) modernizers; and (iii) democratic -- all three at once? Does he have an example? I can only think of the Egyptian Brotherhood, and they could only be very marginally considered democratic (one of three), rhetorically and practically.   The fact that virtually all of the main Muslim countries are run by tyrants does not necessarily mean that their opponents are benign nationalist, democratic, modernists.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 05:29 PM

I agree that Obama, aside from his unique personal history and his racial profile, is pretty much a "standard" American president and is acting like one so far.

*****

Eric Margolis has spent the last 30 years traveling to Pakistan, Afghanistan, Baltistan, Waziristan, the Siachen Glachier region, Kashmir, the Northwest Frontier areas of Pakistan and India, Tibet, etc, and he is intimately acquainted with many of the principal military and political commanders in that region. He has been on numerous warfronts, bivouaced with the troops, and has friends among the commanders of, for example, the Pakistani Army and the Mujahedin, Taliban, and many other such factions. He knows what is motivating them.

He states unequivocally in his writings that a large majority of the Muslim fighters who are fighting both India and the West in those regions are NOT religious fundamentalists of the kind typically caricatured in the West, and are not opposed to modernization and/or democratization of their societies. They are nationalists. The more extreme Muslim fundamentalists who are the chosen "boogeymen" of western media (since they serve a great propaganda purpose for furthering the War on Terror) are a distinct minority among those Muslims willing to fight to get India out of Kashmir and the West out of the various occupied Muslim lands. It is incorrect to characterize the conflict as one between extreme Muslim fundamentalism and western democracy. That's not what it is. It is a fight of Muslim nationalist independence movements vs. western colonialism and western-dominated proxy governments...plus it is the ongoing bitter struggle between India and Pakistan, which is in fact the most dangerous part of the conflict by far, because India and Pakistan have a large number of nuclear weapons, and could use them on one another at any time if things get out of hand....which they well may.

If so, it will immediately kill millions and injure perhaps a hundred million more...and that will just be the beginning.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: robomatic
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 03:56 PM

I personally think that Obama is a more or less 'standard' American President, only, I think and hope, smarter than the previous one. I'm sure you noticed that according to his pre-election statments about prioritizing the war, we sent more men to Afghanistan almost before we did anything else anywhere. We have maintained our attacks from our drones in the air and used them more than almost during the entire Bush regime.
Nevertheless, what is going on, the big picture, is that the Islamic world is in a full scale civil war where its literalist, 'fundamentalist' elements are trying to make a last ditch stand against the secular world of the Twenty First century. It is variously counter-interpreted as a war against other religions, a war against Western oppression and occupation, a war against the forces of Shaitan, a war against globalization, etc. etc. Most of the major religions have their own similar movements, but have been held at bay because of multi-cultural linkages suppressing the most extreme versions of these memes. In Europe's case, the memory of the Thirty Years' War. But Islam is a much younger religion and takes the form of unification of Church and State, sort of where Europe was 400 years ago.
I think Obama's background of living in Indonesia is one of the most valuable things we've got going for us in this situation. Other than that, he is as American as any President in word and deed. If these difficult operations in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, etc. can be dealt with successfully, he's the guy to do it.

Again, the thread title is a fabrication, it is a mis-statement and mis-direction of what is going on.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 01:54 PM

I'm willing to bet that if Hitler had never invaded and occupied Poland that hundreds of thousands of Poles would never have volunteered their services in WWII to anyone at all who would provide them with a gun or a ship or an airplane, and gone out and enthusiastically killed Germans...

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: CarolC
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 12:52 AM

I'm just saying that the "If we didn't do [this] then they wouldn't do [that]" theory of world peace and harmony doesn't appear to work when you get down to some of the nitty gritty details.

How would we know? We've never tried.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 12:34 AM

Well, heric, let's say you have a feud between two individuals that goes on...and on...and on. Or make it 2 nations. There are always past offences that both can point to in such a feud. There are always reasons for both to be angry, based on what has happened between them in the past.

But it doesn't end until one party decides to stop feuding. Endlessly calling the other party "evil" and trying to kill them all or terrorize them into surrender will not work.

You're never going to kill all the Middle Eastern and other people who are angry about American business and military policy in their countries. You just can't do it. They get born much faster than you can possibly kill them. They're never going to kill all of you either, and I'm sure they know that full well, but they will keep fighting because our troops are on their land. And that's one hell of a good reason to keep on fighting. They are not on your land, you're on theirs.

You (Americans in general, I mean) would fight too, if an occupying foreign army from some greater military power was on your land. And you'd never stop fighting them till they left.

What Osama launched his jihad over way back in the 90's was the presence of American troops in Saudi Arabia and the fact that the corrupt Saudi Royal family is in cahoots with American business interests and doesn't represent the common people of their country. For that he had his Saudi citizenship taken away.

I can fully understand his position on that. That doesn't mean I agree with him launching terrorist attacks on civilians, but I do understand exactly what he is objecting to. His political cause is legitimate...although his methods are not, if they involve attacking civilian targets in the USA or elsewhere. If they involve fighting USA occupying forces on Muslim lands, though...and they do...then his methods in that respect are completely legitimate, from the perspective of most people living in those lands.

These things have to be understood. You can't wait for "the other side" to grow up, let go of all its old hatreds, and find a path to agreement that suits your purposes...and you can't just dismiss them as "evil". It's never that simple. They aren't any more evil than you, they simply have their own interests. You've got to make the first move in that process of finding common ground yourself or it may never happen.

And it's the foreign occupier who MUST leave in the end...not the local people. These wars won't end till your soldiers (and privately employed mercenaries) leave those lands. There is no "victory" to be found by America in these wars. Victory is impossible for America under the circumstances in the Middle East and central Asia. Victory can only come finally to the local people when all the foreign armies leave.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: GUEST,heric
Date: 03 Jan 10 - 12:12 AM

I'm just saying that the "If we didn't do [this] then they wouldn't do [that]" theory of world peace and harmony doesn't appear to work when you get down to some of the nitty gritty details.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 10:48 PM

People only normally disagree with that sort of thing when it wasn't their idea...while they agree with it enthusiastically when it was their idea.

The American revolutionaries were terrorists and traitors in the eyes of the English. They were freedom fighters in their own eyes. They were traitors in the eyes of the loyalists in the colonies (who comprised roughly 50% of the population and many of whom fled to Canada at war's end), and the loyalists were traitors in the revolutionaries' eyes.

It's always a question of whose ox is being gored or what side of the fence you're standing on. The reason Islamic fighters in Afghanistan were seen as "freedom fighters" by the USA in the 1980s was simple...they were killing Russians! ;-) Now that the Russians are gone, they're killing Americans. They are still fighting for the same thing they were back then: to drive out a foreign army of occupation.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: CarolC
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 10:32 PM

Heric, did you intend for your post to be in another thread? Somehow it doesn't seem to fit in the discussion on this thread. At least not anything I've posted in this one.


The American revolutionaries didn't have the authority to declare their independence and set up a democratic government, either, but we don't quibble with their right to do it. The same holds true for the democratically elected government in Iran that the US illegally deposed in a CIA backed coup.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Bobert
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 09:15 PM

Well, Obama really hasn't had to make too many policy decisions, LH... Yeah, he coulda been stronger on health care and lost what little gains the US may make... Maybe he should have... I mean, who woulda blamed him... I mean, if Bill Clinton couldn't get anywhere why would we expect Obama to???

He could have also said "no" at a time when it looked as if the financail system was going to collapse and, again, maybe he should have... Hard to say???

And yeah, he could have stood up against the military industrialists and the right wing noise machine on Afganistan and in doing so would have surely lost any chance of health care reform...

But the guy has been in a political meatgrinder and no matter what he does it ain't gonna make too many folks happy on any side of the issues...

Persoanlly, I would have told the generals to stuff it on Afganistan but I'm not president...

Yer right, being president is "another story"...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 08:04 PM

Well, the thing is, Bobert...you and I aren't in the position Obama is. We have the luxury to talk in ideal terms about what could be done, and without experiencing the consequences. He doesn't. He's in the middle of it. Nevertheless, I'm sorry to say that I basically disagree with most of the decisions he's made so far while in office...although I do admire his rhetorical abilities. He's definitely preferable to John McCain (who can also shoot his mouth off now without facing the consequences). That's the luxury of not being the guy in power. You can say whatever you want about what you would do... ;-) Actually being there is another story.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Bobert
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 07:51 PM

I'd like to think that Obama has spent quite a bit of time reflecting on the history of the region along with the the failings of the Vietnam War...

Yeah, it's easy to say that Obama oughtta just apologize and have the US pull itself into a shell... Not so easilly done... Yes, I am concerned about escalations in Somalia and Yemen but I'd rather see good intellegence and surgical strikes than invasions and occupations... Kinda a choice of two bads but what are ya gonna do until there is some level of stabilization???

I mean, other than just advocate unrealistic policies...

Sould we have even invaded Afganistan??? No... Iraq??? Hell no... Stupid policies... Hey, if I have figured it out I'm sure it has also crossed Obama's mind... And I hope it will influence his policies...

Also, we have to keep in mind the political realities here in the US which are ver messed up...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 07:36 PM

Our cartoonists? Heh! Surely you jest...

Look, I am opposed to all forms of terrorism, not just the state terrorism that is practiced by ambitious empires and great powers. I am also opposed to individual acts of terrorism by Islamic terrorists who set off suicide bombs in markets, hijack airplanes, and attack Dutch cartoonists.

This is the same as to say that I'm against all forms of criminal activity, which I am.

It doesn't change my opinions on American foreign policy one iota, because it is that foreign policy, plus the similar activities of Russia, Great Britain, and Israel, that have created the overall situation that incubates so many non-state Islamic terrorists. They are a reaction to the aggressive empire-building practiced by the more powerful countries on the weaker ones, and they are also a reaction to the local dictators propped up in their Islamic countries by Russia and the USA.

There is no immediate action the USA can take that would instantly resolve all of what has happened, but to further involve our troops in occupying Muslim nations is an action that will only exacerbate the situation, not improve it. Remember Vietnam? It was unwinnable. So is this war. The smart thing to do with an unwinnable war, specially when you are the occupier...is END the occupation.

What would follow an end to western occupation would be further infighting and further war between local groups in those countries, but that is their business, not ours.

Another huge problem which is contingent on all of this is the constant risk of a major war between India and Pakistan over longstanding issues in Kashmir and the disputed mountainous regions north of Kashmir. The USA is considerably worsening the risk of that by its ruinous military policies in Afghanistan and the Pakistani northern border areas, because those activities are greatly destabilizing Pakistan and enraging the Pakistani populace, which once considered the USA a friend and ally (while India was allied with the Russians). India watches this new situation like a hawk, hoping to cash in on Pakistani weaknesses. The Indians are delighted to see the USA alienated against the Muslim world, because that serves India's strategic concerns...in regards to Pakistan.

As for the Pakistanis, they have never been more isolated, more alone, and in a more miserable state than they are now. The only strategic "friend" they have left at this point is China...because China is also at odds with India.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: GUEST, heric
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 07:12 PM

Despite the elegant structures of your arguments, LH and CarolC, they present no logical or practical way to keep them fellers from killing our cartoonists, so I think you do not really have the solutions to our problems. Your theories, in other words, must therefore be off on a tangent. How must the US respond in a way that you will say "makes sense," when confronted with an absurdity such as cartoonisticide.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 06:16 PM

fact: Whenever a country with a large amount of domestic oil decides to control its own oil and market that oil to the world in whichever way it pleases, it soon becomes an official "enemy" of the USA and Great Britain. What follows is either a foreign-supported coup which brings down that country's government and installs an Anglo-American puppet in its place...or a open war with that country.

As for monarchies, I'm not necessarily against them. Britain has had a monarchy for a very long time, and I'm not against that. Nor am I against the Thai monarchy. Nor the Dutch monarchy. Nor any peaceful and reasonable monarchy. I am opposed to the Shah's dictatorial government following 1953 because it established a totally undemocratic rule, crushed a fledgling democracy, and was allied with foreign oil interests to the detriment of Iranian national independence. I am not well impressed in the least by the revolutionary Islamic government which replaced it in 1979 either, but at least they represent themselves instead of representing American and British oil interests.

If I was Iranian, I would prefer that to having the Shah in power.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: pdq
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 05:40 PM

fact: Persia, now known as Iran, was a monarchy from about 1500 BC until 1979, when the government was destroyed by IslamoFacists. That is a run of 3500+ years in a unbroken series of monarchies.

fact: The Pahlavi monarchy lasted from 1925 until 1979. It had two kings. The term "shah" simply means king in Persia.

fact: The Iranian Parliament was created by the Shah and served at the pleasure of the Shah. It did not have the power to elevate Dr. Mohammed Mosaddeq to the supreme learership postition he claimed.

fact: The Revolutionary Guard killed more people in their first year the the Shah did in his 38 years of rule (1941-1979, inclusive).

fact: John Perkins is a professional liar. Always was and always will be. He said so himself. The current story of Iran 1953 come from Perkins and is substantially fantasy. The books he wrote made him a millionaire. That was their purpose.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 05:08 PM

Precisely. What Carol said.

It is because "the CIA is an agency of the US government which carries out tasks assigned to it by the National Command Authority" that the CIA commits the very actions to which Muslims object so strenuously, and that is why those actions have caused Islamic fighters to retaliate against the USA in various ways.

Mossad, likewise, acts on behalf of the government of Israel, and arouses the same sort of anger in Muslim populations.

From those angry populations come individuals who decide on their own to take some sort of violent retaliatory action. If so, they represent themselves and many people who agree with them, but they do not represent any government. Such are the members of Al Qaeda. They represent themselves and some very aggravated Muslims who agree with them, but they do not represent a government or a nation.

The USA response to 911 didn't make sense. It was a criminal act, not an act of war by a sovereign nation or the armed forces of a nation. As such, it should have been dealt with as an international police matter...not a war. The invasion of Afghanistan was a completely illogical and ineffective way to react to a criminal attack by a few Egyptians and Saudis under the alleged control of someone hiding out in some camp somewhere in the mountains of Afghanistan.

It was kind of like Russia going and bombing the hell out of Los Angeles because nine crazy guys from Kentucky and Alberta did a terrorist attack on Vladivostok...and they were rumoured to have received their orders from Kevin Costner who was hiding out in Los Angeles.

Idiotic.

But this time you had a "Pearl Harbour" event...yet no Japanese Navy, no Japanese Army or Air Force, and no Japan to retaliate against. Still, you had an infuriated and traumatized American public who wanted someone to pay for 911. So what did the US military do? Well, they did the obvious foolish thing...they went off to pulverize a wretchedly poor Muslim country that did NOT plan or cause 911, a country with a bunch of poorly-educated and naive Islamic fundamentalists in power who were complete fools when it came to presenting themselves to the world...a PR disaster in fact. Nobody in the world even recognized them as a legitimate government except for Pakistan and 2 other Muslim nations. They made a perfect punching bag for an angry America...and who would object? The Russians likewise detested them.

So Afghanistan and the Taliban got pulverized. And that made angry Americans feel better. (whoopee) It did absolutely nothing to reduce the risk of further Muslim terrorist attacks nor did it do anything to improve the security of the USA or anyone else's security. It was a completely inappropriate reaction to the events on 911. In time it has grown into a war that can't be won. Well, the Russians know all about that already...they had their turn in the 80s.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: CarolC
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 03:54 PM

I don't see anyone in this thread suggesting that the CIA acts on its own initiative, artbrooks. It looks to me like people are criticizing the US government for sending them to places like Pakistan.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: artbrooks
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 01:50 PM

Conspiracy theory: the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is a bunch of loose cannons, who go off on their own to do whatever mischief their pointy little heads come up with. Fact: the CIA is an agency of the US government which carries out tasks assigned to it by the National Command Authority. For example, the CIA overthrow of the semi-democratically elected government of Iranian PM Mohammed Mosaddeq, with the active assistance of the British SAS, was ordered by President Eisenhower, at the request of British PM Churchill.   Many of the operations carried out by the CIA have been, at best, morally reprehensible but that doesn't mean that they ever did anything without specific orders.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 12:45 PM

What "conspiracy" would you be alluding to? The coup events in Iran are well-documented. I don't call it a conspiracy, I call it normal geopolitics on the part of great powers who wish to control the supply and marketing of oil, a vital strategic resource. The Great powers who have mostly interfered in the Muslim world since the end of WWII are Great Britain, the USA, Russia, and the USA's proxy in the region, Israel.

The Muslims there don't see it as a conspiracy, they see it as an open war between the local populations and several great imperial powers. They are quite correct in seeing it in those terms.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: CarolC
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 12:39 PM

Just in case anyone might think that because of artbrooks' post, the CIA backed coup in Iran in the 50s is a conspiracy theory, it is not. It is a verifiable fact.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: artbrooks
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 11:56 AM

I am often amused by Mudcat's conspiracy theorists.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Jan 10 - 11:43 AM

The CIA folks were there in Iran way back in the 1950s too, Bobert. And what were they doing there? They were arranging the overthrow of an elected government which had had the bad sense to nationalize the country's oil industry (previously run by and for the benefit of UK oil companies). That government was replaced by absolute dictatorial rule by a western-backed monarch, the Shah. This has not been forgotten by Muslims, but it's barely a vague memory to most Americans, if they even know about it at all anymore.

Like I said, this war started a long time ago.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 10:17 PM

Well, I for one, am glad that the CIA folks are there, Rigs... That means that Obama is moving more toward dealing with bad guys as bad guys and not invading countries with conventional armies and then occupying them... May not be perfect but beats the heck outta the last guy's approach...

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: GUEST,heric
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 10:10 PM

"how we fomented the insurgency against us."

First, they came for the cartoonists. Bloomberg

Oh me oh my we must turn over our cartoonists or they will get us all! (Then we can move on to all the other things we do that make us deserve this punishmment.)

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Riginslinger
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 09:25 PM

How is the administration framing the discussion about the CIA people who were killed in Pakistan. Is anybody asking the question, "Why were they there?"

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 05:45 PM

You're quite right, robomatic, that it is no great revelation...but what I'm talking about is how the USA mass media discusses the war and how they work to sanitize what Washington is doing.

In truth, all state-sponsored wars fought on foreign soil inevitably involve acts of terrorism upon whomever the war is targeting. But they only call it "terrorism" when their opponents do it.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: robomatic
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 05:24 PM

I don't think it's a big drop of the scales off the eyes to call it state sponsored terrorism (on our part), the military under the 'W' regime was dense enough to make a point of calling it "SHOCK AND AWE" if you remember. This was stupid in many dimensions, because it pretty much sent the message, "We're better beCAUSE we're bigger and badder" and then it couldn't live down to the message 'member all those big holes we left around Baghdad full of vaporized people who turned out NOT to be Saddam? This is part of how we fomented the insurgency against us.

And it aided the cynical definition: "A terrorist is someone who delivers a bomb without an airplane"

And I think the current administration is aware of it to the extent that it is trying a hearts and minds approach in Afghanistan and Pakistan and getting out of Iraq.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 01:35 PM

"This is terrorism on a state scale."

Ah! Now there is the real truth which is never spoken in the western media. The so-called "War on Terror" IS itself terrorism on a state scale and on a really enormous scale, terrorism as practiced by western governments and their armed forces and covert agencies against various Muslim nations, and that is exactly the way most Muslims see it. They also see Israel's aggressive activities beyond its own borders in that same light.

They see themselves as the people who are victimized by terrorism, who are fighting against terrorism, and I think they are quite correct in seeing it that way. There will never be any lack of willing recruits to fight the American and Israeli forces in the various occupied lands, because that is how people react to state-sponsored terrorism. They take up arms against it.

Terrorism does, of course, provoke counter-terrorism. That's inevitable. If you look at the body count in this war, however, the terrorism practiced by western governments and armies is so much greater in its violence and destruction than the terrorism practiced by scattered groups of jihadists such as Al Qaeda that for the USA to imagine it's righteously fighting a war against terrorism is sort of like Stalin imagining he was righteously fighting a war against totalitarianism.

Absolute nonsense, in other words. An extremely exaggerated case of the pot calling the kettle black. A very big lie.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Peter T.
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 09:19 AM

Concerning the Yemen, it certainly looks to me like the same old shit. The Obama administration has covertly given the Yemeni government cruise missiles and so on (it is not clear who is in charge of their deployment) to drop on people it doesn't like, and are supposedly Al-Qaeda members. Last week they blew up a lot of people -- note, these people were not brought to a court, nothing has been proved against any of them, they weren't subject to any declarations of intent, and it is more than likely that a whole lot of them were innocent, but, hey, we get to blow them up because we feel like it is a good idea because sometime they might be dangerous to us or to the Yemeni government (who are one more bunch of criminals -- the reason why Guantanamo is not closed is because the Americans don't trust the Yemeni government to handle its own nationals, but, hey, they are our bunch of criminals). This is terrorism on a state scale. I don't know what else to call it.

Curiously enough, this seems to make people angry, and help recruits people against America. Can't figure out why. Baffles me.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Bobert
Date: 01 Jan 10 - 09:13 AM

Home cultivation??? Man, I'm all for that... I could grow it in my veggie garden where I could tend to it properly and where stupid deer don't eat it... But, no... I gotta go up into the mountain and grow it in terrible conditions and then you put in 10 plants and then 6 are male (which is bad) and of the 4 females only two thrive and of the two a stupid deer eats one down to the ground...

Grrrrrrr????

Yes, home cultivation would do just fine, LH.... I'd be happy with just 2 or 3 healthy females... Plants, that is...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 08:07 PM

You're quite right, Peter. It's completely pathetic. The British aren't the only ones who have discovered the futility of an ever-expanding empire and its eventual collapse. As well as them we have had the Soviets, the Nazis, Napoleonic France, Spain, Holland, Italy, Japan, Belgium, Rome, Greece, Persia, and many others....they all took over various other people's lands, stirred up hostility and resistance in so doing, spread their military control farther and farther afield, and finally the whole damn over-inflated megalomaniac structure collapsed under its own weight.

As will the present American imperial order.

Doug, you have a misunderstanding as to who the "enemy" is, and who created the whole situation in the first place, that's all. The people building the American geopolitical empire in other people's lands created the situation, and the terrorists are merely a symptom of the fallout from the anger and bitterness that has aroused in those lands. The so-called "war on terror" started officially on 911, but it started in actuality as early as the 1950s when the USA began effecting CIA-orchestrated regime change in places like Iran and extending its geopolitical dominion all over the Middle East.

The terrorists you fear have simply been a response to that. If your government wasn't intruding upon and disrupting their societies, they would not be attacking you. Russia is also very much to blame for this, because they were playing the imperial geopolitical game in that region too...but their ambitions came to a disastrous end in Afghanistan. I expect that American ambitions will come to a similarly disastrous end in fairly much the same way.

NO Muslim country has attacked the USA. NO Muslim government has attacked the USA. No Muslim nation has attacked the USA. The USA has attacked them, and it continues to do so.

The "terrorists" are a semi-organized response to that by non-governmental forces. Since their people's governments do not dare to act (being extremely outgunned by America and often run by local puppet governments who take their orders from Washington), the so-called terrorists who arise among those populations take the matter into their own hands. Approximately 90% of Pakistani civilians hate the USA at this point, Doug, and it's not because they're ignorant, it's because they're responding to a real situation that affects their country. They don't hate democracy. They WANT democracy. They don't hate our western culture. In many ways they admire it. They don't hate the Christian religion. What they hate is the fact that their government has become an almost helpless American puppet and their sovereignty is being daily violated by American aircraft, and their civilians are being killed by American airstrikes. This infuriates the ordinary people there, and from the ranks of those infuriated people will come the young men that America terms "terrorists"...because they dared to resist an empire.

Bobert - I'm in favor of legalizing pot too. ;-) (for personal use and home cultivation by the user only...not for commercial sale)

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Bobert
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 06:33 PM

Well, Peter, depends on how Yemen is handled... If it's handled like Afganistan then we have a problem... If it's handled more in terms of intellegence and surgical strikes then, hey, that's progress 'cause we are moving more and more toward moving from this War on Terrorism to a War on Tarrorists... Big difference... The second implies more police work than what Bush did in occupying countries... Those were colonila/geopolitical decisions like cluttered up the entire last century...

Happy New Years backatcha...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Peter T.
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 05:56 PM

Of course the terrorists will continue. There will always be terrorists. There were terrorists before 9/11 (some homegrown). The point of terrorism is to make people terrified, and the way Americans get so easily terrified, the incentive is sure there. One guy gets on a plane with burning underpants, and the whole American universe comes unplugged.

Like I said, it's a cycle. The British discovered (as have empires before them) that in order to protect their "necessary" boundaries from outside attack, they need to expand their boundaries, which provokes new attacks and so on. Eventually, this collapses from over-extension. And then it is discovered that the "necessary" boundaries aren't all that necessary.   The British (speaking of the British) seem to be doing all right empire-less.

The crazy American problem (due to the fact that their military is so powerful and George Bush was so stupid, and 9/11 was so spectacular) is to keep treating this as a war and legitimizing the terrorists. The British treat these creatures as criminals -- hello, trial by jury -- and once upon a time they resisted to the end treating the IRA as a real "army". I spent the 70s in Britain, and there were bombs going off all the time, and it was a little nerve racking, but that was it. The Yemenis are now about to be given the American gold standard treatment -- the new grand enemy -- and it will play out like all the rest. When you only have a hammer, the world is a bunch of nails. When you have a vast military, everyone is a potential enemy. It's completely pathetic.

Happy New Year.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Bobert
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 05:27 PM

Well, LH, other than legalizin' pot, Which I would throw in, I reckon that our plans are purdy much the same...

But you hit the nail on the head in recognozing that it really is impossible for Obama to do these things... That's the reality part of the question I posed...

Yeah, it's easy for ol' peacenicks to sit around and come up with lots of ways to get folks to get along better but, hey, we ain't president... I think we all neeed to keep this single *fact* in mind once in awhile when blasstin' away at what Obama does or doesn't do...

BTW, I think we've had this discussion on the "gold standard" and I'm not all that hip on it... Cannibus standard??? Different story...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: DougR
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 05:23 PM

Obviously, LH, I am in total disagreement with your ten point plan.

For example: Suppose Obama declares the terrorist war over and the enemy keeps attacking us anyway?

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 04:25 PM

Here's the problem, Bobert. If Obama were to attempt a 10-Point plan such as I would recommend, he would most certainly and without question be:

1. crucified for it by the political establishment and media in America

2. checkmated at every turn by that same political establishment and mass media

and...

3. assassinated in pretty short order.

He would never live to carry out the 10-Point plan I would recommend...or that Dennis Kucinich would recommend.

So it's academic. It ain't gonna happen, no matter if Obama tried it or anyone else did in his position.

He is probably doing what he is doing because if he doesn't, he's a dead man.

I would:

1. Immediately begin withdrawing all US troops, mercenary contractors, and "advisors" from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Yemen, and all other Muslim nations that the USA is presently mucking around in. I would declare the "War on Terror" over. And it would be over, because the provocations that cause it would have ended.

2. Close not only Guantanamo, but also the various other secret internment facilities where the USA is holding prisoners without charges.

3. Apologize for having launched unjustified wars of aggression against both Afghanistan and Iraq, and pay them damages for the destruction that has been wrought in those wars.

4. Re-open an investigation into what happened on 911.

5. Institute a REAL universal public health coverage plan in the USA, similar to what exists in most western democracies.

6. Instruct the CIA to stop subverting foreign governments and engaging in covert operations on foreign soil...or else get shut down.

7. Cease giving military aid and moral support to client dictators in places like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Yemen, and many others. Cease giving automatic support to Israel no matter what Israel decides to do, and treat them by the same standard as all other nations are treated.

8. Change the banking rules in the USA so that the power of the banks to create vast amounts of money out of thin air is terminated.

9. Give the bailout money to small business and the general public, not to the banks.

10. Put the dollar back on a gold and silver standard (that is, each dollar redeemable upon demand in gold or silver). This would require major alterations in the currency, needless to say.

Anyone who was president and who attempted even a quarter of the program I recommend above would be killed in short order, so like I said, it's purely academic, and it ain't gonna happen. Imperial orders do not accede willingly to reforms that don't suit their imperial plans, and they will kill anyone who attempts to institute them.

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Bobert
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 03:06 PM

Wouldn't be too much to ask you two for *your* Ten Point plans, would it???

Rules: Must be appreciative of the realities that Obama inherited and also the realities of a world shaped by a century of colonialism, hatred, misunderstanding and corporate interets...

Now... Have at it... This oughta be fun...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Obama caught in blatant lying
From: Little Hawk
Date: 31 Dec 09 - 02:07 PM

You are quite right, Peter, and it seems to suggest very strongly what I have been saying for years...that the Democratic and Republican parties are simply two halves of one outfit that supinely serves the same behind the scenes controllers, meaning the people in charge of the military-industrial complex and the major banks and other huge financial organizations.

That the American presidents are bascially elected figureheads rather than real leaders...

And that the elections are used to mesmerize the public into imagining that they still have a real democracy and a real choice, when in fact they are ruled by an oligarchy that controls both political parties regardless of who wins an election...and that uses those 2 political parties to perpetually divide, conquer, confuse, and control the public consciousness.

And by the way...that's fairly much what we have in Canada too, and in the UK, although not nearly as bad yet as it is in the USA...but getting worse, I think.