“What a Difference Embedding Makes”
Jimmy Massey, Ron Harris, and Ambush Journalism
When I wrote Hideous Dream, a memoir about the 1994 US invasion of Haiti, I noted a book by Bob Shacochis entitled The Immaculate Invasion, that I only read after I’d completed my own book. In my introduction I praised Shacochis for his engaging rococo prose describing the places he’d been in Haiti for the first few months of that occupation. I also took him to the woodshed for over-identifying with the troops he ate and slept with in Special Forces; because behind his lively writing was a piece of pure military hagiography. Shacochis was an embedded reporter before we knew what embedded reporters were. By living with these troops, and on a few occasions depending upon them for his physical security, he had set himself up to fall in love with them.
His book became such a fine paean to Special Forces, and one that papered over much of their sheer racism and nastiness, I have to wonder if it wasn’t The Immaculate Invasion that led the Department of Defense to adopt the whole notion of embedded reporters. It really is a propaganda masterstroke. In 2003, “The Measurement Standard,” a K. D. Paine & Associates Public Relations journal, stated (March 28, 2003):
“The current war has been called the best-covered war in history, and certainly the visuals and reports from ‘embedded’ reporters have been spectacular, bringing war into our living rooms like never before [T]he embedded reporter tactic is sheer genius. … The sagacity of the tactic is that it is based on the basic tenet of public relations: It’s all about relationships. The better the relationship any of us has with a journalist, the better the chance of that journalist picking up and reporting our messages. So now we have journalists making dozens — if not hundreds — of new friends among the armed forces. And, if the bosses of their new-found buddies want to get a key message or two across about how sensitive the U.S. is being to humanitarian needs or how humanely they are treating Iraqis, what better way than through these embedded journalists? As a result, most (if not all) of the dozens of stories being filed contain key messages the Department of Defense wants to communicate.”
On April 9, 2003, Ron Harris, a St. Louis Post Dispatch writer embedded with Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 7th Marines, posted a story about Resheed, an Iraqi military base near Baghdad, wherein he described a dramatic daylong battle which included RPGs hidden away in civilian clothes and guerillas “hiding behind civilians.” The battle, as the story turned out, was the apologetic context for the description of Marines firing into a car full of civilians, wounding all of them. Quoting the battalion commander, Lieutenant Colonel Belcher, Harris wrote, “You’re seeing drive-by shootings, suicide bomb attempts, and they’re even trying to use civilians as shields.”
Researching other stories done by Harris over 2003 and 2004, the guerrillas hiding behind civilians becomes a recurrent topic. He was also as enamored of florid prose as Shacochis. That’s what happens when you are writing about those you love.
The problem was, according to former Marine Staff Sergeant Jimmy Massey, who was interviewed at the Boston Veterans for Peace Convention in 2004, Harris’ description was heavily embellished. Contact that day was thin and sporadic.
“As his Marine unit entered Iraq it came upon empty Iraqi military bases with weapons lying on the road. ‘We shot it up with everything we had, and we were laughing and having a good time. The Iraqis let us in the country; we didn’t take it.’
“Upon entering Baghdad his unit came upon an unarmed pro-Saddam demonstration. His unit killed several of the demonstrators. ‘I knew that we caused the insurgency to be pissed off because they had witnessed us executing innocent civilians.’ Massey told us how the U.S.-embedded reporter, Ron Harris, from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch wrote that there was a ferocious battle between his unit and the Iraqi military, but it never happened. The reporter was writing what the Marines wanted him to write.”
Readers need to note the date of this publication: September 4, 2004. This was when Ron Harris was described as an embedded reporter doing precisely what PR experts said embedded reporters are designed to do.
If I were Ron Harris and I read that on the internet, I’d be madder than hell–even if I were guilty as hell. This is not a good time to be seen as an embed, what with the exposure of New York Times hack Judith Miller as a virtual employee of Rendon Group and its pet Iraqi embezzler, Ahmed Chalabi. “Journalists” these days are seen about as credible as Texas Republicans.
Jimmy Massey didn’t meet Harris that day, or ever, because while Harris was embedded with Lima Company 3/7, Jimmy was assigned to Weapons Company. In fact, Ron Harris has never so much as called Jimmy Massey on the telephone or attempted to send Jimmy Massey an email until he called several weeks ago to tell Jimmy to retract all his claims or be “exposed.” The reason I bring that up is that two days ago, Harris published an ambush piece on Jimmy Massey, a year and a half after Massey dissed Harris on his Resheed battle story, and just one month after the release of Massey’s devastating book, Kill Kill Kill, relating his experiences in Iraq, and naming names.
Don’t look for the book here. American publishers ran from this book like it was a rabid skunk. It has only been published in France in French. That’s why Jimmy Massey is pretty sure that Harris hasn’t read it.
Harris hasn’t read the book nor has he called Jimmy Massey except once to demand he retract his claims, but that didn’t deter him from writing his hit-piece–about which I will write more further down–nor did it deter him from getting on CNN yesterday morning and claiming that Jimmy is making mad money from lies on the jimmymassey-dot-com web site, where Jimmy is said to be vigorously hawking $100 copies of his story on CDs.
CNN, by the way, had Jimmy in an Asheville studio yesterday waiting for his opportunity to answer Harris. But, alas, Harris had his day and Jimmy was sent home without so much as ten seconds of airtime to respond to Harris’ accusations.
So let’s set the record straight. Www.jimmymassey.com is not owned or operated by Jimmy Massey, but by filmmaker Nancy Fulton, who posted the following message yesterday on her web site:
“Ron Harris, of the Washington Post-Dispatch has (apparently) volunteered to promote this set of DVDs for us in print and on CNN. It is worth noting that total revenues to Jimmy Massey from this project have been around $250 and 10 DVDs. This domain is registered to the owner of Metropole Filmworx LLC, which are the producers of the Back from Iraq documentary which will feature several soldiers discussing their service in the war in Iraq. Ron Harris didn’t contact us to find out who owned the JimmyMassey.com website or to determine our financial relationship with Jimmy Massey.
“This means Ron’s reporting on the ‘Jimmy Massey’ story is living up to the ‘high standard’ of his reporting in Iraq which failed to mention so much. If you want to know what Jimmy Massey has to say, we recommend that you purchase this set of DVDs. We consider Jimmy a leader in the pro-soldier/antiwar movement. Watch the DVD’s then determine for yourself if a man accusing himself of murder is actually executing some clever ploy for fast cash. — Nancy Fulton, Metropole Filmworx LLC.”
Oops! Ya messed up there, Ron.
In January, 2004, the Marine Corps charged Gunnery Sergeant Gus Covarrubias, 39, of Las Vegas, with making false statements when he told a reporter that he’s shot an Iraqi soldier in the back of the head. Covarrubias could not corroborate his story, so the Marine Corps charged him for making accusations of war crimes he said he had himself committed.
If the actual claims–which must be distinguished from the representations that Harris has made against Jimmy Massey–made by Massey were indeed incapable of withstanding close scrutiny, it seems more than a little odd that no one has charged him even in civil court, yet Massey has been talking for well over a year about his experiences.
Not a single legal charge has ever been leveled at Massey; and I’ll wager there won’t be any charges. That would risk too many exposures and too many questions, and Abu Ghraib is about to pop back into the news when the courts release a new set of photographs, whereupon we can all be reminded again of the humanitarian nature of this occupation.
Scandal is on the administration and the military like hungry ducks on hapless June bugs. They do not want to charge Jimmy Massey, because what he has been telling people–that civilians are being killed by the thousands in Iraq–is straight-up true.
Instead, the Marine Corps is refuting Jimmy Masseys allegations with the conclusion of its own “investigation” into the claims Massey has made, which according to Harris were made available to him, and which he repeated in his hit-piece in the Post-Dispatch as well as his one-man monologue on CNN yesterday.
The Marine Corps investigated itself and exonerated itself. Shocking! Lock up Massey right now and throw away the key!
Harris claims that Jimmy Massey said:
“Marines fired on and killed peaceful Iraqi protesters.”
That is a bald-faced lie. Massey said “unarmed” protesters.
“Americans shot a 4-year-old Iraqi girl in the head.”
You can google-search “jimmy massey 4 year old child” if you like. You will not find this quote from Jimmy Massey anywhere. Harris writes himself that Massey says that he once witnessed a dead 4-year-old in the road, not that he saw her shot in the head. But even with this backpedaling embedded equivocation, Harris got it wrong. This statement, according to the only stories I could scavenge off the internet, was made by another Marine and only cited by Massey.
Pretty different, I’d say.
Harris goes on in the same hit-piece to claim that Massey said he had personally killed a 6-year-old. But Massey says that this was a misquote that grew legs. There was a child among the dead when demonstrators were shot in Resheed. The original statement was “I brought these series of events up through the chain of command. Each time I was told they were terrorists, or they were insurgents. My question to the marine corps at that point became, how was a 6-year-old child with a bullet hole in its head a terrorist or insurgent?”
Reads a bit differently that Harris’ smear-job, doesn’t it?
If anyone doubts that reporters do in fact fuck up as well as misquote people, I will say for myself that I have been misquoted more than quoted in the last ten years, but let’s let Harris’ own accuracy be put to the test in this very article.
Harris says, “While touring with Sheehan in Montgomery, Ala., he told of seeing the girl’s body.” Sheehan did not join that leg of the three-bus tour until Atlanta. She was never in Montgomery. I just got an email from Cindy confirming that. No big deal in most circumstances. Just a minor error. But since what is good for the Massey-goose is examination with an electron microscope, let’s just say its sauce for the Post-Dispatch’s embedded-gander.
Second-hand scuttlebutt from blogs misquoting out of context does not strike me as very sound journalism, but then I’m not a journalist. Those are the only place, however, where you can find anything resembling Harris’ peculiar and venomous construction of Jimmy Massey.
Massey never claimed, as Harris reports, that he shot a 6-year-old boy either. He never claims to have shot a 6-year-old at all.
I have no way of knowing why Harris is doing what he is doing, or who may have put him up to it. Maybe he has cobbled his lurid war tales from the 2003-4 embedded period into a book of his own–”Ron and Lima Company’s Excellent Adventure–Traveling with the Jarheads and Watching Iraqi Terrorists Hide Behind Women and Children.”
Here may be some excerpts (taken from his “news” reports):
“What a difference embedding makes.” (1-13-2004, Post Dispatch) [He really made this the opening statement in a breathless and appreciative article about Donald Rumsfeld’s military. I couldn’t have made anything that rich up on my own. A bumper sticker maybe? ÂSG]
“For this new offensive, journalists would travel as the men and women of the Navy, Air Force, Army and Marines did. They would eat what they ate, sleep (or not sleep) as they slept, bathe (or definitely not bathe) as they did.
“They could talk to all of the troops in their unit, from privates and corporals and sergeants to lieutenants and captains and colonels, and on some occasions, even to generals.” (Oh, gee whiz, even to generals!) The truth is that much of what journalists saw or did or the information that they gathered through conversations wouldn’t have happened without the assistance of the units they were with It was through the relationship that we established that they shared their stories, food, water and concerns with us. It was Capt. George Schreffler who urged us off the ground during a sandstorm for fear that we would get run over by a vehicle during the night.” (4-26-2003, Post Dispatch)
The story of Resheed wasn’t the only place he expressed himself about the terrorists “hiding behind civilians.” He likes that bromide, and though this seasoned reporter steeped in virtuous skepticism has never thought to ask himself how unusual it is that cities have civilians in them. He not only used this notion to excuse the shootings of civilian vehicles in Resheef, he eagerly rebroadcast this claim again when spinning a drama about “the road to Ramadi.”
“‘We’re trying to get the snipers in position for a shot,’ Major George Schreffler told the other commanders through tactical radio communications. “They’re looking at guys in blue uniforms and others with black clothes and black masks. Some are using children to shield themselves.’”
Great stuff! True grit and big brass balls!
Jimmy Massey’s sin is that he hasn’t transformed Iraqis into extras on the set of a modern-day frontier masculinity script. Though Harris yesterday on CNN claimed that Jimmy is motivated by “profit,” Jimmy and his wife have been living pretty close to the margin since Jimmy was released from service with severe post-traumatic stress disorder. Contrary to this scurrilous assertion, Jimmy Massey has been trying to tell anyone who will listen that a hell of a lot of civilians are being killed in Iraq the very thing that Harris has worked so diligently to excuse. Little wonder that the mirror that Jimmy Massey holds up to reporters who compulsively justify these killings is one they need to break.
The real sin, of course, is opposing the war. This is part of an escalation against war opponents. The LA Times just reported that one of the biggest churches in Pasadena was warned by the IRS before last year’s elections that it could lose its tax exempt status if it preached against the war.
Harris, a Black man, who right-wing bloggers love to love when they are doing a yeoman’s task for God, the Market, or the War, has now become the darling of these white nationalist internet denizens. These puerile neo-fascists gleefully blasted Harris’ November 8th hit-piece through the blogoshpere faster than you can say Free Republic.
But not everyone was so happy.
“Vanity Fair” was cited by Harris, and so was “USA Today.” Not exactly bastions of anti-imperialism, both publications reportedly called Harris on the carpet yesterday for misrepresenting Massey interviews they conducted, and for claiming that neither had checked their sources.
“He began turning up in the media last spring,” wrote Harris of Massey, “with stories about military atrocities. Massey’s primary thrust has been that Marines from his battalion–some of whom, he told a Minneapolis audience, were “psychopathic killers”–recklessly shot and killed Iraqi civilians, sometimes, he said, upon orders from their commanders.”
Evidence to the contrary, says Harris, is the fact that the Marine Corps denied it. Give that man the Seymour Hersh Muckraker Medal!
During the Marine Corps’ extensive investigation of Jimmy Massey’s claims, there was one person the Corps never once attempted to contact for a statement: Jimmy Massey. Whoever that investigating officer was, promote him immediately. Make him the commander of CENTCOM.
Jimmy has been diagnosed with a debilitating case of PTSD. In public presentations, he has repeatedly advised audiences that his memories are not clear. But since Ron Harris never attended a single presentation by Jimmy Massey, he doesn’t know that either. He does make a claim that Jimmy made statements in an interview with the Post-Dispatch that he couldn’t back up with documentation, but Harris himself does not provide documentation of the interview where Massey allegedly did this.
Here is what Dr. Craig E. Abrahamson, a PTSD researcher said today in response to an email:
“I am presently in Vietnam, and am conducting research regarding family violence, not just in this country, but in others as well. Just to give you some back ground, I have worked with veterans of the Vietnam War, Desert Storm, and now the War in Iraq. I also work with victims of domestic violence, both women and children. My belief and findings indicate that indeed initial memories of trauma are very vague, and in the process of flashbacks, nightmares, and talking, the memories become more vivid.”
“None of the five journalists,” says Harris, “who covered the battalion said they saw reckless or indiscriminate shooting of civilians by Marines, as Massey has claimed. Nor did any of the Marines or Navy corpsmen with Massey who was interviewed for this report.”
Let’s think about this for a second. A tactically dispersed 900-man battalion with five journalists, at least three concentrated in one company, and the members of the units do not shoot any civilians with journalists watching. Pretty unbelievable, eh? And no corroboration from the “MARINES AND NAVY CORPSMEN INTERVIEWED FOR THIS REPORT.” Well, hell, that’s just definitive, two years later no less.
Two people who Harris obviously didn’t interview were Andrew Howard and Ryan McFarland, two members of Massey’s platoon (not some distant sister company) who gave testimony to Jimmy’s publisher corroborating Jimmy’s claims.
Harris didn’t interview Brad Gaumont either, or if he did, Gaumont didn’t repeat what he said into a Danish reporter’s tape recorder last year: Referring to civilians who were killed, “They had it coming anyway; Iraqis are scumbags.”
Harris also missed Jeffrey Fowlers, who disliked Jimmy and told people Jimmy Massey had been “fired. “Jimmy is trying to slander the MC because they fired him but he was just as much a part of what we were doing [killing civilians]. We were assuming they were terrorists. There were no explosives but it’s highly probable there could have been weapons. We were all pissed off [at shooting women and children]. Nobody was doing it on purpose.” But they were doing it. They were killing civilians. Plenty of them.
Let’s just quote Harris’ (April 9, 2003) article, where Jesse Schutz of the 3/7 says, “We’re not trying to shoot civilians. If they don’t stop, then we fire a warning shot, and if they still don’t stop, it’s either them or us.’
See, I’m sitting here with a computer and a telephone for one day, and I seem to be able to do a better job of digging up the truth than Ron Harris was, and he was there with the 3/7.
“What a difference embedding makes.”
Jim W:
As to why Ron Harris does what he does, can’t we believe strongly that reporters/journalists probably won’t have their jobs long or even get them in the first place unless they conform to what the bosses(rich owners and investors) want. I think you mentioned in a post not long ago that there are acceptable “boundaries” that most media are contained within. If the crisis of capitalism is marked by concentration of wealth and I believe now with significant erosion of purchase power relative to wages by the majority (even or especially in the United States) then it seems correct to postulate that those boundaries are shifting steadily rightward.
Michael Parenti has made the comment that journalists tend to say that they’re not gagged or told what to say, but to the extent that’s true it’s because they tend to say that which is expected of them. Parenti I believe mentioned, and I agree, that there is a weeding out process that is undoubtedly enhanced by the desire of journalists to “get ahead” and thus conform to their superiors’ wishes.
Aggravating thoughts can come into your mind that include those such as “the money that goes into the hands of media pundits (and the television/radio industry in particular) comes from advertising revenue that is part of the cost of my purchase whether or not I even listen to, read, or watch or agree with such advertising supported content.” For example, those who don’t own a television do not get a discount when buying something because they DIDN’T see the advertisement. The cost of the product includes advertising. So we are essentially feeding the mouth that bites when we buy commercial products.
For all intents and purposes, the web for as long as Bill Gates or anyone else doesn’t interfere is the main source for the exchange of ideas relative to the common good. We should consider the ideas/information on this website and others thoughtfully and realize they need to one degree or another our support, financial or otherwise. I second the motion requesting donations to Stan Goff and his operation.
On this matter we don’t want to err on the side of caution.
8 November 2005, 10:47 pmStan:
Thanks, Jim.
8 November 2005, 10:52 pmEd:
Is Massey’s story that he and “his men” killed unarmed protesters in Baghdad true?
9 November 2005, 12:30 amStan:
Is this your set-up question, Ed? What do the quotes on “his men” mean? Jimmy has described this incident, and it has been corroborated by members of his platoon.
Watch for the next post from another veteran.
I wonder what people suppose the motive is for these vets to tell what happened… or in the war apologist version why they would make these things up.
Ed, the US is killing Iraqis, lots of them. Not Iraqis that are attacking the United States, but Iraqis that live in Iraq.
Just admit you are an imperialist, Ed. That would be more honest than these tortured rationalizations. You believe the US has the right to invade and occupy other countries that present no threat to the US itself. I do not. You believe our great white political fathers are more qualified to direct the social development of other people than the people themselves are. You can tapdance around with all these proclamations of “responsibility” to continue the armed occupation of another people’s country all you want, but at the end of the day, you are saying you support the invasion and occupation of other countries by the US. It’s the same ol-same ol former British imperial mantra, dressed up to make it PC… the white man’s burden to civilize the darker races.
9 November 2005, 7:51 amEd:
Stan,
It’s not a setup. It’s a simple question. I have not seen the corroboration for the incident, and would like to. If Massey’s version of the incident can be backed up, it goes a long way towards proving your arguments about Harris’ journalism.
It might be satisfying for both of us to abandon rational discourse and just fling rhetoric at each other. For now, I will ignore your attempt to do so. Stick to the facts, Stan. You’re not a qualified mind reader.
9 November 2005, 8:27 amStan:
Ed, you are a passive-aggressive, I swear.
What were the quote-marks around “his men”? Jimmy was a platoon sergeant. And your quotation marks made this more than a “simple question.” That was internet sarcasm. Don’t fart while you piss on my leg, then tell me there is a thunderstorm.
9 November 2005, 9:34 amCyndi:
Ed,
9 November 2005, 4:54 pmDid you not watch the Fallujah Massacre video? Why would you think that Massey’s story needs anymore corroboration than that? U.S. soldiers are killing A LOT of Iraqi Citizens. What part of these accounts coming out Iraq that you don’t get? If Iraqi, Russian, Israeli or American Military troops, for that matter, came through your city and blasted the hell out of it looking for insurgents, do you not believe your civilian neighbors would get caught in the crossfire? War fought in cities and neighborhoods are without doubt going to cause countless civilian lives. But why do I feel the need to explain this to you? After watching the Fallujah Massacre video I can’t offer up intellectual banter (such as Stan does) to argue your posts; I’m much too disturbed to pull myself away from my emotional reaction to it. This war is wrong. It’s horrible and it is setting us all up for horrible consequences. What part of that don’t you get?
Stan,
Shit! Ed’s tortured rationalization will never end. There are rational reasons, I’m sure, why you continue your discussions with him, and that’s the part I don’t get.
Stan:
I don’t feel the least bit intellectual about any of this. My son is already preparing himself mentally for his third trip there. My personal opinion is that in a more perfect world, Bush and his entire cabinet and staff would be hauled into the street and shot… but I’m not suggesting that, so the Treasury Department can save themselves a trip. The only thing I’ve killed in quite some time is a squirrel, and that was because I could’t veer away fast enough when the arboreal rodent got indecisive in front of my car.
Ed is important to this discussion, because he so consistently cleaves to the official line. It serves us as a kind of workout for our more public discourse on the war; like a military training exercise. The funny thing about this is, from my own standpoint (funny ironic, not funny haha), is that if the average Democratic elected official were on this discussion, s/he would be taking almost exactly Ed’s line. Shumer and Clinton and all the other mucky-mucks in the DP already are. Perhaps Ed can follow through with a second career n politics, like Wesley Clark (No direct connection implied, Ed. You were never an ass-kisser when I knew you, and Clark had a reputation as a legendary ass-kisser.)
Ed is right that white phosphorous is a standard bit of ammunition. It is isued as a 40mm grenade launcher round and a hand grenade… as an incendiary. That’s what white phosphorous does. It burns. There is a perennial problem with many who have not been in the military making all sorts of erroneous technical assumptions. But I included the video precisely so people could hear the testimony of these lads (both of whom I know - they are members of IVAW, who were in DC on 9-24), and get a real audi-visual impression of the war, and a snapshot of the massive revenge-crime that happened in Fallujah. That’s what “liberation” looks like; and that’s the reason I occasionally get short with Ed.
I quit being a patriot and a follower and a Man some time back in exchange for recovering my full status as a human being.
9 November 2005, 6:17 pmEd:
It’s not intellectual for me either. I leave for Iraq (again) in 3 weeks. I will bear a lot less risk than your son, but that’s not by choice.
Cyndi, your emotional reaction is understandable. That’s why Stan posts the film. But surely you are perceptive enough to realize that emotional appeals are easily manipulated to serve either side, and are thus fodder for propaganda by both sides. I could easily make a film entirely composed of gory footage of the victims of insurgent suicide bombings, all of them civilians minding their own business in markets and mosques when they were blown to bits. Those victims number in the thousands too.
The first thing Stan and I learned in leadership training is the imperative to control your emotions and think clearly and rationally under stress. None of us are vulcans, but thinking with your kidneys will get you killed in combat, and lead you to advocate stupid positions in a debate.
Stan’s film is in no way, shape, or form a corroboration of Massey’s story. Massey was out of the Marines well before the storming of Fallujah. I think Stan gets this point, which is why he hasn’t made such a claim. The only thing relevant to Massey’s story is what Massey saw and did, and which can be corroborated by others in his unit.
The Massey story is exceptionally simple. There are only 3 possible permutations of the truth regarding his major allegations:
1) Massey never said those things.
2) Massey said them, and they happened that way.
3) Massey said them, and they didn’t happen that way.
If either 1 or 2 is the case, then Harris is a liar. If so, I want to know it. I’m not so wedded to my position that I want journalists lying to support it. Any reporter fabricating an article should be professionally ruined, including Harris if he fabricated this.
On the other hand, if 3 is the case, I want to know that too. Because if that’s the case, then Massey is guilty of defamation against myself and my fellow soldiers, and I want him publicly humiliated to the point where nobody would listen to him taking food orders at McDonalds.
I’m playing straight with you, Stan. I want to know. If you’d rather spew invective than address the cold hard facts, then I’ll stop wasting my time here.
The reason for the quotes around “his men” is simple. There are suggestions in Harris’ article and other sources that Massey made claims about atrocities he committed or witnessed, then later backpedaled on and claimed that he was “told by other Marines.” I’ve seen video where he says “me and my men” in describing the protester incident. Let me state categorically that if this were to be Massey’s line of defense on this incident, he would be exposing himself as a liar. So I wanted to highlight the specificity of his language, to preclude an “oh, some other guys did it and told me about it” defense. If that doesn’t apply, you have nothing to worry about. If it does, you and Massey have bigger problems than my quotes.
So stop with the drill sergeant aphorisms and address the facts. If you’ve got corroboration, post it. I genuinely want to see it.
By the way, you read me wrong as a Cadet. I was a bit of an ass kisser at school and in the first half of my career. Then I realized that my true goal was to earn the respect of my men, not the accolades of my superiors. Not coincidentally, I will soon retire as a rather undistinguished O-5 who was not selected for command. So be it.
And I’m glad you get my role as OPFOR. I was beginning to wonder.
9 November 2005, 9:00 pmJon Flanders:
“The Massey story is exceptionally simple. There are only 3 possible permutations of the truth regarding his major allegations:
1) Massey never said those things.
2) Massey said them, and they happened that way.
3) Massey said them, and they didn’t happen that way.”
If stories like Massey’s were so simple, then why do we have courts and lawyers?
I would assume there are members and higher-ups of his unit who would want to deny anything happened, to protect themselves.
The only way it could be simple is if a deus ex-machina had a wide-angle video camera over the whole scene with a very high resolution lens and a high powered microphone. This DEM would also have to be invisible, since the military takes a dim view of such reportage and would undoubtably seek to shoot it down, blow it up and confiscate the film.
Therefore the kind of research Stan did is necessary. And it is also necessary to have the historical perspective to put the possibility of such incidents in context.
Supporters of the US Government’s position must of necessity ignore history and context and stick to the kind of nitpicking that was the defense of Bush’s military service.
Finally, I give you this simple proof of Massey’s story.
The US government refusal to support an International Criminal Court to which the US military would have to answer.
10 November 2005, 10:11 amCyndi:
I appreciate that you both understood how emotional I was (still am, I guess) about my reaction to the video. Stan you are right to keep your discussions open with Ed. I get it. As I wrote it I got it. Ed knowing you will be heading off to Iraq scares me. Don’t go. Keep your son home too Stan. Wishful thinking, I know. Implying that you guys intellectualize this was to imply that my way of thinking is simple (in no way am I surrendering to the “stupid positions in a debate”comment from Ed). Stop the war. Bring the troops home now and imagine peace. Perhaps this way of thinking doesn’t help to move the discussion forward, so thanks for listening.
10 November 2005, 1:20 pmIt was my first time to get short with Ed. Hopefully it won’t be my last. Come home alive Ed, functioning kidneys and all.
Nancy Fulton:
The real issue is that Jimmy Massey challenged an embedded journalist named Ron Harris over a year ago. He specifically named Ron Harris as being inaccurate in his reports.
Now, a year later, Ron Harris has identified himself as both a “witness” and the “investigator” in his articles about Jimmy Massey’s lies (which Vanity Fair and others DID fact check - thank you very much).
Ron Harris must understand he can’t “investigate” someone who has accused HIM of lying. And I’m just baffled that the press hasn’t picked that up yet.
Frankly, I’m more than happy to have both men speak, to hear their descriptions of what they saw.
I take extreme exception when one claims to know what the other DID NOT see, especially when its a reporter who is claiming to be running some kind of impartial investigation.
But, and this is the true thing, no one disputes the checkpoint killings. No one disputes that unarmed civilians are killed every day in Iraq. And people who insist on trying to reduce claims of war crimes to the staements of just one man and the “radical left” are living in a fantasy land.
Unfortunately, their tax dollars are paying for a war in the real world. Soldiers are dying in the real world. Our government has misled us in the real world. And “terrorists” fueled by our government’s lies and our governments killings can attack unarmed civilians here in the Real World.
So . . . I hope the people trying to live in fasntasland wake up soon, cause the price of willful ignorance is getting pretty high.
10 November 2005, 4:06 pmhoward:
“I could easily make a film entirely composed of gory footage of the victims of insurgent suicide bombings, all of them civilians minding their own business in markets and mosques when they were blown to bits. Those victims number in the thousands too.”
A premise of the above passage is that the horrific deaths of civilians due to insurgent attacks balances, indeed goes a way toward justifying, any “accidental” death we mete out to innocents.
There is however a qualitative difference between “our” killings of the innocent and helpless and “their” killings of the innocent and helpless. “Our” killings are our moral responsibility, paid for with our taxpayer dollars and our votes. Furthermore, “their” killings do not justify “ours.” In fact, it is quite demonstrable that “their” killings would not even be happening at this moment had we not invaded.
I hope this thread continues for a while, since it is, as Stan says above, a way of sharpening our skills for the wider public debate. In that vein, I notice a rhetorical technique Ed employs (one employed in the typewriter font brouhaha as I recall over that letter about Bush’s military service last year) — which is that, if I can find something wrong, incorrect, or dishonest in one of your sources, then your entire position is therefore disproven (that letter was a forgery, therefore Bush did not shirk military duty). Ed’s implication seems to be that if Massey was incorrect or dishonest about something, then no US forces have committed atrocities and US troops everywhere can hold us in righteous contempt.
It seems those of us who wish to make broader points sometimes expose ourselves to this kind of argument. For instance, anti-war activists will point to what happened at Fallujah as an illustration of other things that may be happening in other parts of Iraq. I think the pro-war side is smart enough to understand this, but it seems they try to deflect the import of such an example by saying things like “ha! he wasn’t anywhere near Fallujah!” [leaving one to infer that we were attempting to pull one over on our audience, so this other stuff we are alledging is therefore false].
I’m sure none of us think for a moment that Ed is dense enough to believe that Stan is trying to fool us into thinking that Massey was in Fallujah. What the film does do for Massey’s account is to show that what Massey speaks of is by no means unprecedented.
Now, for my request for some argumentational advice. I am blessed with my own face-to-face version of Ed, in the form of a sharp, informed liberal friend who thinks that a possible Democrat sweep of Congress next year might hold out some hope for a “saner” Iraq policy. He did seem momentarily dismayed when I reminded him of Kerry’s and the Clintons’ position on the war, but basically he and I have gone round and round over the following points — if anyone cares to jump in here, I’d love to see your thoughts:
Friend: I don’t want to see us rushing for the exits in Iraq until we have carefully weighed and analyzed the most likely consequences of our exit, and the possibility for greater bloodshed once we are gone.
Me: We have no way of predicting the future, and besides it isn’t ours to decide what other people do with their own country.
Fr: Of course we can get knowledgeable experts to give us possible future scenarios and weigh them in an intelligent way, instead of rushing out of Iraq the way we rushed in. Besides which, this moralizing about what is and isn’t our or somebody else’s responsibility still does not absolve us of responsibility if something really orders of magnitude more horrible than the present situation happens due to our leaving too soon. Simplistic moral positions don’t work — I still hew to the Utilitarian idea of the greatest good for the greatest number. A stringent moral position is admirable, but there comes a time, like WWII, when the SS and EinsatzGruppen are on their way and they will kill anything that moves, and even good Quakers will take up arms.
Me: Even the experts didn’t see such an obvious thing as the impending fall of the USSR [i didn’t say that, wish I had]. And besides, we are working with reality here, not a Newtonian universe of predictable physical phenomena. One normally can’t predict a chess game more than a move or two in advance, and that’s just 32 pieces on 64 squares [didn’t say that either, oh well]. And anyway, predictability is beside the point. We have brought horrible devastation to a country and how can we now propose to use the same blunt instrument that we smashed it with to somehow “help” it? It is just racism to say that we must stay there for the Iraqis’ own good.
Friend: your rigid moralizing won’t cut it in the real world and I am not a racist. Also, by your reasoning nothing would ever get done because the moral motive wouldn’t be pure enough.
Me: But you’re the one advocating the cautious embrace of the status quo [I didn’t say that]. And I can be quite pragmatic. It’s just that in this case, where we are talking about killing people as a tool for bringing about your Benthamite greater good, the bar needs to be set pretty damn high.
etc. etc. etc.
Anyway, I sense a logical fallacy in his appeal to “expert opinion” before being able to change anything now that we are there and a certain pre-quantum quaintness in his faith in a predictable future (I think we did discuss the butterfly effect).
I won’t be miffed if there are no replies to my rambling, but in general I would really be interested in hearing more discussion of techniques for argument and discussion, especially in light of Stan’s comments in a few places on this site about the need for being aware that we have different audiences.
11 November 2005, 3:10 amhoward:
One more additional observation: I thought I noted the slightest, most uncharacteristic pause in our animated discussion after I remarked:
“We could have had this same conversation pretty much anytime between 1964 and 1973.” (friend & I are both 52).
It also seems to me that my friend is of that numerous class of people who accept as an unspoken premise (as I think I did until shortly after our conversation ended) the proposition that “hard-headed, tough” approaches are always more “realistic” than those approaches that can’t be characterized as “hard-headed” and “tough” and “difficult.” Seems this is a coding for some kind of plug-in to patriarchy, but I’m not very versed in that kind of talk and it’s late at night and I’m a working man.
Happy Veterans’ Day to all
11 November 2005, 3:20 amEd:
Howard,
First, let me sheepishly admit that your friend, through your voice, does a better job articulating my views than I do. You should consider his points rather than asking for help out-arguing him.
You seem to argue that it doesn’t really matter if specific examples are true, because the overall accusations are true. But this is wrongheaded. Such thinking is equivalent to the LAPD mentality that it was ok to plant evidence because “everyone knew OJ was guilty.”
Such muddled thinking appears to be a feature of this blog. Stan posts some story of illegal and immoral US conduct in Iraq. The story falls apart when examined closely. Stan and several readers respond that “it doesn’t matter whether this particular story is true, because everyone knows these things happen.” But of course it matters. Try arguing in court that the evidence may be false but the defendant is still guilty.
Facts matter. Fabricated or misrepresented stories undermine your claims rather than supporting them. Confessions are more persuasive than witnesses, and witnesses are more persuasive than hearsay. Corroboration strengthens evidence. These are basic principles of evaluating truth.
The left knows that specific examples matter. That’s why they have Massey speak at anti-war rallies. But if Massey turns out to be lying about major aspects of his story, then clearly it calls into question his reliability as a witness, and undermines his specific claims of Marine “atrocities” in Iraq. As I said, I’m genuinely agnostic on Massey. But enough doubts have been raised that I’m not willing to take his word for it. I’d like to see some corroboration, which Stan promises is forthcoming.
11 November 2005, 6:51 pmStan:
Ed, I never said any such thing. I said that what Massey says corroborates with specificity what is the embarrassing truth for Bush, Centcom, war apologists, and (emotionally) embedded reporters. The US is killing civilians. Lots of them.
11 November 2005, 9:57 pmEd:
So are the insurgents. Even more of them.
11 November 2005, 11:10 pmhoward:
My mention of Ed’s rhetorical technique was not meant to concede that Massey’s accounts are not substantially true. Nor has Ed or Mr. Harris shown that Massey’s accounts are substantially untrue. I was talking about what might turn out to be inconsistencies in details of Massey’s accounts [”Jimmy has been diagnosed with a debilitating case of PTSD. In public presentations, he has repeatedly advised audiences that his memories are not clear”], inconsistencies which, from what I have read, appear to be inconsequential to the general veractiy or believability of what he said. Where an inconsistency actually undermines the trustworthiness of an account then one must question that account more closely, of course. So far, all I see in this case is a bunch of back-and-forth about the wording that someone else (Harris) used to characterize Massey.
As Ed says, “Confessions are more persuasive than witnesses, and witnesses are more persuasive than hearsay. Corroboration strengthens evidence.” — is not Massey’s a case of confession?
And along the lines of corroborating evidence, I’d be interested to see Ed’s list of the “fabricated or misrepresented stories” on this blog that “fell apart” only to be rescued by an appeal on the part of Stan and others to a Higher Truth. Then, if there are such “stories” on this site, I’d like to know what percentage are they of the total accounts on the site.
As Stan says, it is true that we are killing a lot of civilians in Iraq — I don’t think anyone would deny that, not Ed, not anyone else.
The root issue is whether or not one agrees that our killing of civilians is justified.
11 November 2005, 11:41 pmhoward:
Stan: The US is killing civilians. Lots of them.
Ed: So are the insurgents. Even more of them.
So, it’s ok that we kill who we kill because we don’t kill as many as somebody else?
11 November 2005, 11:54 pmchris:
“So are the insurgents. Even more of them.”
…thanks to the destabilizing presence of “Coalition” Forces. Of course we don’t really know who’s killing more of them since the U.S. won’t tell anyone how many they’re killing or relabeling Insurgents.
12 November 2005, 12:35 amPretending Massey’s story has fallen apart doesn’t make it so. Misquoting him doesn’t either.
CL:
Massey’s rebut:
12 November 2005, 1:38 amhttp://counterpunch.org/massey11102005.html
Nancy Fulton:
So is our killing of Iraqi civillians justified?
No.
The fact that people with a political and military agenda DO NOT have a right to slaughter unarmed civilians is what the “War on Terror” is about.
Remember 9/11?
_IF_ you say it is ok to slaughter unarmed civillians in order to acheive political/military objectives, you’ve become Osama.
What makes (or made) this Nation a shining city on a hill is is its founding principle . . . People have rights granted by God which NO government has a right to violate.
The US government DOES NOT have the right to imprison, shoot, torture or kill unarmed civilians in Iraq any more than they have the right to imprison, shoot, torture or kill unarmed civillians in downtown New Orleans, Los Angeles, New York or Chicago.
Its wrong, its unethical, its unchristian and its fundamentally unamerican for the US government to wage war such that soldiers are forced to kill unarmed civilians, or to design military operations in such a fashion that civillians (including children) are killed “by mistake” day after day, month after month, year after year.
So far this war has caused the deaths of 2000 US soldiers, great injury to about 15,000 more US soldiers, the deaths of 100,000 or so Iraqi’s.
It has also cost US Tax Payers 200 Billion or so US dollars (tens of billions given in No Bid Contracts to people who “invested” in the president’s campaigns).
And we’ve accidently established the “precedent” that the President of the United States and his adminsitration (and his intelligence agencies) can use misinformation to justify a war and never pay the price. (Which many conservatives are not going to like when a liberal is sitting in the oval office).
This nation has made grave mistakes before. Slavery, Jim Crowe Laws, the Japanese interment camps . . . The War on Iraq is one of those mistakes.
Anyone interested in what soldiers have to say about this war should visit http://www.militaryproject.org, http://www.optruth.com, http://www.ivaw.net. They should visit the amnesty international, human rights watch, red cross or red crescent websites to learn more about conditions on the ground in Iraq.
Getting the truth isn’t rocket science.
Just stop listening to TV’s Talking Heads, stateside generals and politicians.
Do those folks USUALLY tell you the truth?
Regarding Jimmy Massey, if you haven’t heard Jimmy Massey speak, you don’t know what he has to say. Its just that simple.
13 November 2005, 6:15 pmm.c.:
I listened to Jimmy Massey debate Ron Harris on Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now today. I thought he did a good job. Like Stan, Scott Ritter and the countless other current & former military veterans who are bringing the uncomfortable truth home which is as badly needed as a double expresso at 6am. The fact that Jimmy is catching the flak that he is means that his message is strong and making some in power uneasy. Hang in there Jimmy! Make the bastards sweat.
14 November 2005, 11:19 pmEd:
There has never been a war, and there will never be a war, in which soldiers do not kill unarmed civilians with regularity. Certainly not since the invention of firearms and explosives. That goes doubly so in any war involving insurgency or guerrilla warfare. Some of your moral outrage should be directed at the people who make civilians targets by adopting tactics such as suicide car bombs and hiding attackers inside unarmed protestors, both tactics explicitly outlawed by the Geneva conventions for that very reason.
15 November 2005, 9:49 pmScotFree:
I did some web checking on Ron Harris. Found some things of interest. Listen to radio interview at
17 November 2005, 1:32 amhttp://www.harrisonline.com/audio/ronharris05.mp3
In it Harris says that after 2nd time back from Iraq, and planning to go back to Iraq for 3rd time (probably in December), he had an e-mail from a “guy†alerting him to Massey and possible untruths. WHO was e-mal from? Bears checking. Harris also said “someone in the office said, before you go to Iraq why don’t you deal with these allegations†(meaning Massey). WHAT office? He doesn’t specify. This suggests story was assigned by an editor at St. Louis Post Dispatch. Harris also says, in context of this info, that he wanted to “out this guyâ€. Harris had originally seen article in “hometown newspaper” (NC?) about Massey, and seemed suspicious of that. WHY? He had no way of knowing then that no checking/corroboration was being done on Massey; this was a year ago. WHAT made Harris suspicious, other than a predisposition to distrust a dissident, who was saying things counter to the unit(s) he’d been embedded with?
All this sure seems like Swift-Boating in reverse to me. Extremely grateful to read Stan’s Counterpunch essay.
Also: Nancy Fulton in a post (above) says “The real issue is that Jimmy Massey challenged an embedded journalist named Ron Harris over a year ago. He specifically named Ron Harris as being inaccurate in his reports.” Could you elaborate?
gamal:
I would suggest that those who want an iraqi view of intercommunal violence try the iraquna blog of abu khaleel, he has a post from 12.1.04, that is 1st dec 2004, post on this.
“iraq has no history of intercommunal strife” paul wolfowitz, increadibly mr.wolfowitz is telling the truth.
the weird notion that iraq is made up of warring religious identity communities is a convienient trope advanced by the new colonialists it has no basis in fact.
there is a great degree of tension within the shia community over the approach of sistani, an iranian, sadr’s significance is that he is the only prominent figure, currently in the shia ranks who is an iraqi arab.
iraq in its present form is a creation of british imperialism, however al-irak is an ancient idea and has since the beginning of time been a multifaith and ethnic society, riverbend also deals with the nonsense of “sunni supremacy”
husseins regime was secular and his inner circle was dominated by tikritis not sunni’s, fallujah was a constant thorn in his side, like ramadi, hilla etc as the americans knew and treated them accordingly.we have never submitted to cenral authority, or to be honest there was always a limit to our submission.
the baath party had 3 million memembers, not 1.5, mostly shia reflecting the make up of the society.
the thing that bothers us is that the arguments of people such as ed is that they rely on the ignorance of his interlocutors.
and lets be clear no one in iraq believes the zarqawi myth or that al-q is anything other than a black op, in particular al-q in iraq. it simply makes no sense whatever, there have been pitched battles between the resistance and people claiming to be sectarian mad men.
i would suggest a visit to the albasrah site of the iraqi resistence.
the notion that we are unable to live together is bs, most shia have sunni realtives and of course vice versa.
one of the first things the americans did was to drive a tank over the grave of michel aflaq, the christian pan-arab ideologue.
ed you are fooling yourself, stay away from iraq if you have any self respect, the US administration is not fooling us with this hogwash about civil war, a war they have done everything in their power to precipitate.
the kurdish parties have between thwm killed more kurds in factional conflicts, puk pkk etc than even saddam, and as to turkey well no more need be said, the kurds are cursed with appalling leadership.
the badr brigade fought for iran in the ruinous war of the 80’s, they seem to have been caught out at the interior ministry torturing and killing “sunni’s” excedpt that those being tortured were by no mens all sunni, the story broke because we have been pointing out their activities for some time and they have offended so many shia that only the US army can keep them in place, the british have been using them to irradicate the intelligentsia, irrespective of confessional status and finally in 1991 iraq had the highest per capita rate of Phd’s in the world we are not your brown children who need civilising.
jazak allah khairan Mr. Goff for your great efforts on behalf of humanity. iraki history could be summed up as “people invade us, we fuck them up and they leave.” raed jarrar. sorry for rambling i dont see much point in directly dealing with the tendentious self serving myths that the lords of humanity deploy to save their self image, forgive me.i hope no harm befalls any of you who travel to iraq to kill, rob and dominate us and i hope that while in iraq you harm no one, or when you return home for that matter.
all the best
gamal.
17 November 2005, 5:20 pmStan:
Dear Gamal,
While I would never ask you to waste time dealing with tendentious myths, your voice is welcome, nay, highly valued, here and I hope you will continue to explain these complexities.
I just finished three days hitting one speaking event after another in Maine, precisely to argue for an immediate Anglo-American withdrawal from Iraq. You are struggling for your people’s self determination, and I am struggling for the transformation of this osciety — which will be a monumental task carried out by multiple social movements, because our culture exists in a straitjacket of tendentious myths.
Your post here has served to validate much of what I can only infer from study at a distance, and which many of us have been working very hard to explain. We have been to some degree successful, as the poll numbers show, but I am also brutally clear that much of the increasing resistance to the war — which is valuable in any case — is that it has been impossible to conceal the political and military disaster this has been for the US. I reject that chauvinism, even as I acknowledge its tactical value toward the accomplishment of the main objective, which is to see the withdrawal of the occupation. But many of those I have spoken with are deeply troubled by this war on a less chauvinist and more fundamentally moral basis. They are offended and genduinely troubled by the terrible costs they suspect are being paid by Iraqis.
The most important next “layer” of people to be won over to a position in suport of immediate withdrawal are those who are troubled in this way, but who have been exposed to no other impression of Iraq than that you describe perfectly as “the weird notion that iraq is made up of warring religious identity communities is a convienient trope advanced by the new colonialists it has no basis in fact.”
It is for this reason that vices like yours, that carry with them more authrity than my own, are so important in overcoming this trope and describinb the real and complex reality that is Iraq, in order to take away their last reservations about the real and simple acton the US must take: leave.
Thank you again, Gamal. Please don’t be a stranger. You have friends here.
18 November 2005, 3:36 pmgamal:
Dear Stan i would like to share with you the transcript of a broadcast i made just before the destruction of Fallujah, to an audience of 8 million on the popular radio 2 morning programme in the UK.
But first i owe an apology to Ed to whom i intended no disrespect, but i am tired stan, my heart is a little broken, no bad thing in and of itself, one of my students is an iraqi shia lady and law graduate, (i follow a form of religion uncategorizable as either sunni or shia we do not consult with scholars) whose torment has for years now slowly caused her to lose her reason it is utterly tragic, we are not reducible to the simple syllogistic reasoning of those newly aquainted with our no doubt attenuated humanity, we haji’s that is.
“Like many people, I suppose I have over the last few hours been watching those eerie night vision pictures of the fighting in Falluja. If I could share one part of my experience, the thought that really occurred to me, was that you really must be careful not to let things like this chew you up inside.
From whatever perspective you view these events, don’t let them inspire anger and hatred in your heart.Because we are blessed with leisure and security, we can think and reason.
The way I think about Falluja is this, I consider all those involved in the unfolding nightmare, from the thousands of American soldiers, doing their duty; imagine every little detail of a soldier’s life and the chain of events that has led him or her to Falluja. And then, the inhabitants under that fearful bombardment, with their families and their terrified children. You see if you think honestly about what Falluja means in human terms there is no place for anger, Falluja is testament to the shortcomings of anger. As we see aggression is wantonly destructive and cruel, with this in mind we see the madness of responding to events like this with anger, anger is the cause of our suffering.
You see spiritual advice works whichever side you are on, whatever your view is. If we really confront the suffering in this world, it can only humanize us, cause the milk of kindness to flow in our hearts, and you never know, it might spill out into our actions, in the Quran and I’m paraphrasing here, the prophet is instructed to offer protection to his enemies, “So that they may hear the truth, and take them to a place of safety, because it may be that there are those who do wrong merely from ignoranceâ€. (9:6)
This is a statement of deep compassion and wisdom, you see we are powerless to affect the events in Iraq right now, but we can make our hearts a place of safety for all, impartially, forever. By practising forgiveness, not grudge bearing, by practising empathy rather than condemnation, by taking love rather than fear as our motivation.
Faith really is a battle for our hearts and minds, and Falluja is a blazing beacon for the cause of love, and a reproach to the cause of violence and confrontation.
If we take our spirituality seriously we must have deep compassion for our enemies, it may be that they will be tormented for any wrongs they may have committed against us, what a tragedy, we should beseech God for their forgiveness, after all when you have done wicked things in error. Don’t you crave forgiveness? Cant we all say of ourselves that we have followed a bad precedent, we do not practise what we preach wisdom poirs from our mouths while hatred remains in our heart, we pray that we will on no account be the cause for others to suffer retribution whatever they may have done to us. may all those in fallujah be safe, and every soldier be protected and every citizen be spared. there is a story told in iraq of one of jesus’s disciples who died and then appeared to him wearing sandals of fire. “why are wearing those ?”
jesus asked him “I never wronged anyone said the disciple but once i saw a man being beaten and i did not go to his aid so God has given me these sandals of fire to where”
we are each others keepers and the dictates of love are fearsome and those who ignore them will meet love in its most fearful guise.”
all the best
gamal
18 November 2005, 7:33 pmEd:
Gamal,
It is interesting that on the same day you claim that AQIZ and AMZ are “myths”, two suicide bombers would blow themselves up in mosques in Khanaqin, killing at least 64 Shia civilians. http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/FE7151EF-B660-47FE-A305-F359077257A2.htm
This type of attack has been nearly a weekly occurrence for the last year. Who do you suppose is carrying out these attacks? Surely you don’t think any western intelligence service is competent enough to stage hundreds of suicide bombings in the heart of Arab society without being caught?
Your argument about Iraqis being able to live together is a classic strawman. In case you are not familiar with that idiomatic term, here is the wiki definition:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man_argument
Nobody argues that ordinary Iraqis hate each other and are unable to live together. Such conditions are rarely a natural state in any society. But that condition is not necessary for civil war. All that is required for ethnic violence and civil war is for people to identify strongly along ethnic, religious or tribal lines, and for a small group of leaders to be willing to exploit those divisions through violence in order to gain or keep power. Clearly that situation exists in Iraq.
I met plenty of Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks in the former Yugoslavia. None of them professed to hate each other, and all touted the peaceful multiethnic nature of Yugoslavian society. Yet all sides slaughtered each other brutally when manipulated to do so by their leaders. They had plenty of PhD’s and artists too. Even absurdly minimal differences such as between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland, or non-existent ones such as between Tutsis and Hutus in Rwanda, can lead to uncontrolled bloodshed in the right circumstances.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tutsis
People can live together despite ethic and religious differences. However, competition over resources and power is natural, and there must be a peaceful means to resolve that competition. That is what politics, government, and laws are for. In the absence of a stable political system, any society can degrade into violence and civil war.
We removed the “stable” political system under Saddam, (although I think many Shia and Kurds would argue that the virtues of stability under Saddam were overrated.) Nonetheless, we have an obligation to put something in its place before we leave. More accurately, we have an obligation to facilitate a process where you can rebuild your own political system. Once that’s done, we’ll leave.
Nobody I know wants to stay in Iraq. We certainly don’t want to kill innocent Iraqs, and nobody I know would tolerate robbing. But we’ll go there because we think it’s the right thing to do, and we’ll stay as long as it takes to get the job done. Too many good Iraqis, some friends of mine, are depending on us to help them get on their feet. The fools in the insurgency don’t seem to realize that their attacks only prolong our presence. If you want us to leave, then VOTE.
18 November 2005, 8:20 pmStan:
Just incredible. The colonial hauteur of this is staggering.
This pride will go before a terrible fall.
18 November 2005, 8:52 pmgamal:
a little learning is dangerous tbing Ed, you would do well to look a bit more deeply into the construction of hutu and tutsi identity, here is a hint, the colonial power classed those with some capital, in the form of cattle and land as tutsi’s and those without as hutu, it is a largely meaningless division in terms of ethnicity but represents a class division exascerbated by colonialism.
as to the bombs lets be clear many of the “suicide” bombs are not suicide attacks, talk to some iraqi’s. i am not currently in the mid east, and have been away for some years now. but vote you say for a political system that has been warped by the inclusion of parties based on confessional and ethnic divisions, no way.would you vote for white candidates against black and hispanic ones? absurd or for them, its a joke.
your remarks about kurds and shia are the received wisdom perhaps, but that does not make it correct.
you posted some wikipedia entries, look up saddam and you will see that he was very popular amongst the lower classes of all identities as much of iraqs social programmes, free health care, free education infrastructure, the rights of women etc were infact micromanaged by saddam himself, for which many, shia kurds and sunnis were profoundly grateful.
you know it is amusing, saddam was not iraq and never excercised the absolute power he perhaps craved, the realities of the country prevented it.
when hussien kamal returned it was reported in the west that saddam killed him, that is not exactly true, saddam would not have dared, he was turned over to his tribe who themselves killed him for his treachery, and also perhaps out of fear of offending saddam, in all his years of brutal struggle saddam never humiliated his captives, he tortured and killed, he was brutal murderous and do you think that we have forgotten how he came to power as the cia’s man.
he did not humiliate people because he knew as the americans did not that to subject iraqis to abu ghraib style treatment would lead to endless revolt, beat them kill them, but to make men suck each others penis’s is a self defeating tactic as the americans are discouvering.
as to the bombs we know a lot about british counter insurgency techniques, that include actions under the guise of insurgent groups, malaya, kenya and many more check out the archives.
as to your demand to iraqis to vote let me quote tohoolhoolzote of the wallowa valley nez perce
“who is to tell me what i am to do in my own country”
you have no authority to demand anything of us.
your invasion was illegal, 82% of iraqis want an immediate withdrawal of foreign forces, 37% of americans support the continued occupation.
who can forget the then american ammbassador’s jokey cable about the fate of the leader of the free officers
the shia abdul kareem kasem, beloved of all iraqis for his asetic incorruptabilty
“Kasem has had a fatal illness while standing infront of a firing squad”
the democratically elected govewrnment of syria was over thrown in 1949, by the CIA.
we have no reason to fulfill anyones demands to see our country free, it is rather the occupiers who must justify their continued occupation, and by the way the 100 illegal edicts of the cpa are out of reach of the sovereing government of carpet baggers foriegn agents and sectarians installed by a vicious and murderous occupation.
the bombs mean nothing, do you really believe the soap opera that is presented to represent iraqi history, i am as much shia as i am sunni, and my psuedonym is gamal kangal karabash, which is a joke, but it is a kurdish psuedonym, not arabic but kurdish, becuase i am as much turkic as i am arabic most of us are pretty mixed we have lived in the land of the two rivers for millenia and cope far better than americans do with the complexities of our real identities, i have documents 600 years old from family archives and we are mentioned in ancient treaties, competition for resources? we are not scavenging dogs living in a hobbesian nightmare we cooperate and care for each other.
i owe you nothing and will not accept your callous bromides about what i need to do.
my friend and neighbour abdul majid al-khoie returned to iraq much against our advice and was killed in circumstances that leave us a bit suspicious about the ability of the masters of new orleans to do jack to benefit us.
you as the occupying power are esponsible for our welfare which you prosecute by polluting iraq for all time with du munitions, murdering us in untold thousands, installing men to whom we would not entrust our lame donkeys, your elevated man of letters told the resistance to bring it on, how vile do you think that sounds to us.
america has neither friends nor admirers in iraq which has gone from being a realtively developed country to a hell hole, my family is fractured spread across the globe grieving and distraught, give us back our country you have not earned any right to lecture us saddams crimes were the crimes of successive american regimes, bush pere called on us to revolt and then facilitated saddams bloody repression.
the US wants us to believe that you have our interests at heart, come on, we are not fools we know what is going on and know that our sorrow is just begining but we are used to suffering and can sustain it for a very long time, so those bombings are at least your failure if not your crime. i myself am partially disabled from an unfortunate incident in the early 80’s, but no one can inprison me because there 3000 men who call me brother and will take the field to protect my rights as i would theirs, we understand the meaning of family and loyalty, you think the colonialists will not try to break our unshakable solidarity, we do and we are ready to resist any attempt to remake us as you would like us we are what we are, no great thing perhaps but that is how it is. i have relatives in palestine, egypt and beyond all the false boundaries within which we live.
many shi’i were in that torture bunker, havent you heard do you think as the skin peeled from their bodies that they were celebrating the chance to be americas healots, sistanis forced elections on the occupation, this was just a few months ago, has the siege of lies that your media pumps out made you so foolish as to site our pain to us to justify your domination, we are not buying it, the whole wmd farce is still warm but we are not shocked or awed, if you think the kurdish units rampaging around the jezira swells our hearts with pride you really must take us for savages, we are ashamed of their manifest crimes.
and would happily see them prosecuted and peace return to our ruined land, go home leave us alone we have an absolute right to our little inconsequential lives and to the fruits of our labours.
umm qasr, you need to do some research about umm qasr to realise how we view our current predicament.
you have no right to determine our future or the limits of our social arrangements.
americans seem not to understand that we are free, we have always run our own affairs in our own way, we have survived tyrants invaders fools and criminals and we will survive you.
tell me whem are the elections in saudi going to be, and for what, you do not know our recent history or our capacities and abilities we are no less human than you.
we are not detaining you if want to go, we will not miss o detain you.
the zero was invented in iraq and coincidentally that is the current value of the dinar.
saddam was your man, he paid a bitter price.
jessica lynched in a spider hole didnt you know he was captured by kurds in a house and then paraded around by special forces who staged the ludicrous spiderhole saga.
so many lies i am exhausted good night.
18 November 2005, 11:12 pmgamal
Consumer:
Ed once said something along the lines of “stop with the friggin racist accusations”. If this isn’t racist then what the f”#k is, Ed?
You’re a racist, Ed.
19 November 2005, 7:45 amgamal:
America, America
God save America
My home sweet home!
The French general who raised his tricolour
over Nagrat al-Salman where I was a prisoner thirty years ago . . .
in the middle of that U-turn
that split the back of the Iraqi army,
the general who loved St Emilion wines
called Nagrat al-Salman a fort . . .
Of the surface of the earth, generals know only two dimensions:
whatever rises is a fort
whatever spreads is a battlefield.
How ignorant the general was!
But Liberation was better versed in topography.
The Iraqi boy who conquered her front page
sat carbonised behind a steering wheel
on the Kuwait–Safwan highway
while television cameras
(the booty of the defeated and their identity)
were safe in the truck like a storefront
on rue Rivoli.
The neutron bomb is highly intelligent,
it distinguishes between
an ìIî and an ìIdentityî.
God save America
My home sweet home!
Blues
How long must I walk to Sacramento
How long will I walk to reach my home
How long will I walk to reach my girl
How long must I walk to Sacramento
For two days, no boat has sailed this stream
two days, two days, two days
Honey, how can I ride?
I know this stream
but, O but, O but, for two days
no boat has sailed this stream
La L La La L La
La L La La L La
A stranger gets scared
Don’t fear dear horse
Don’t fear the wolves of the wild
Don’t fear for the land is my land
La L La La L La
La L La La L La
A stranger gets scared
God save America
My home sweet home!
I too love jeans and jazz and Treasure Island
and Long John Silver’s parrot and the terraces of New Orleans
I love Mark Twain and the Mississippi steamboats and Abraham Lincoln’s dogs
I love the fields of wheat and corn and the smell of Virginia tobacco.
But I am not American. Is that enough for the Phantom pilot to turn me back to the Stone Age!
I need neither oil, nor America herself, neither the elephant nor the donkey.
Leave me, pilot, leave my house roofed with palm fronds and this wooden bridge.
I need neither your Golden Gate nor your skyscrapers.
I need the village not New York.
Why did you come to me from your Nevada desert, soldier armed to the teeth?
Why did you come all the way to distant Basra where fish used to swim by our doorsteps.
Pigs do not forage here. I only have these water buffaloes lazily chewing on water lilies.
Leave me alone soldier.
Leave me my floating cane hut and my fishing spear.
Leave me my migrating birds and the green plumes.
Take your roaring iron birds and your Tomahawk missiles. I am not your foe.
I am the one who wades up to the knees in rice paddies.
Leave me to my curse.
I do not need your day of doom.
God save America
My home sweet home!
America
let us exchange your gifts.
Take your smuggled cigarettes
and give us potatoes.
Take James Bond’s golden pistol
and give us Marilyn Monroe’s giggle.
Take the heroin syringe under the tree
and give us vaccines.
Take your blueprints for model penitentiaries
and give us village homes.
Take the books of your missionaries
and give us paper for poems to defame you.
Take what you do not have
and give us what we have.
Take the stripes of your flag
and give us the stars.
Take the Afghani Mujahideen’s beard
and give us Walt Whitman’s beard filled with butterflies.
Take Saddam Hussain
and give us Abraham Lincoln
or give us no one.
Now as I look across the balcony
across the summer sky, the summery summer
Damascus spins, dizzied among television aerials
then it sinks, deeply, in the stories of the forts
and towers
and the arabesques of ivory
and sinks, deeply, from Rukn al-Din
then disappears from the balcony.
And now
I remember trees:
the date palm of our mosque in Basra, at the end of Basra
the bird’s beak
and a child’s secret
a summer feast.
I remember the date palm.
I touch it. I become it, when it falls black without fronds
when a dam fell hewn by lightning.
And I remember the mighty mulberry
when it rumbled, butchered with an axe . . .
to fill the stream with leaves
and birds
and angels
and green blood.
I remember when pomegranate blossoms covered the sidewalks,
the students were leading the workers’ parade . . .
The trees die
pummelled
dizzied,
not standing
the trees die.
God save America
My home sweet home!
We are not hostages, America
and your soldiers are not God’s soldiers . . .
We are the poor ones, ours is the earth of the drowned gods
the gods of bulls
the gods of fires
the gods of sorrows that intertwine clay and blood in a song . . .
We are the poor, ours is the god of the poor
who emerges out of the farmers’ ribs
hungry
and bright
and raises heads up high . . .
America, we are the dead
Let your soldiers come
Whoever kills a man, let him resurrect him
We are the drowned ones, dear lady
We are the drowned
Let the water come
Damascus, 20 August 1995
Translated by Khaled Mattawa and reprinted from Banipal No 7.
Saadi Youssef
>>>Ghassan Zaqtan
19 November 2005, 3:06 pmJosiah:
Wow…Thanks a lot, Gamal. What makes my blood boil is that all the anti-war organizing we’re involved in, and the bullshit coming from democrats who voted for the war and now playing the Eugene Mccarthy role, the U.S. is going to pretend to pull out for moral reasons and pat ourselves on the back for our white western conscience when we pull out. After over 100,000 Iraqis have been killed by air strikes. After 1.7 million (according to UNICEF) Iraqis dead from the sanctions. After the first gulf war. After giving our ex-friend Saddam Bell Helicopters and mustard gas and bacteriological weapons to crush the Khomeinists which he used on Halabja (like the British dropped poison gas on Iraq in 1918). The US isn’t going to pull to till it fully installs a pseudo-democratic theocracy and paints the resistance as a some defeated baathist/alquaeda netwoek, but like Emir Faysal this new puppet regime will not last. There will be more coups, more neo-colonial invasions of the middle east, as the US fights to expand the frontier–or the liebensraum, or “living space,” as the Nazis called it—of petro-consumption and sprawl. Our suburbs are hooked up, parasitically, to your desert. But the difference is, they can’t claim to “discover” the middle east- it’s where those fantastic Aryans (who weren’t “white” anyway, contrary to the homoerotic fantasies of buff blonde warriors entertained by Hitler) built their fucking civilizations! Anyway, thanks for passing on the info about the iraquna site too. Your people have been through a lot of shit at the hands of our people (or really our oil-and-arms-invested representatives), but they’ve survived it, and neo-colonialism will be destroyed.
19 November 2005, 6:51 pmEd:
Gamal,
You owe me no apology for anything you say. You speak directly to the problem as you see it, as do I. I mean no disrepect to you personally when I oppose your viewpoint.
I have talked to plenty of Iraqis. I’ve personally witnessed suicide car bomb attacks. A suicide attack is unmistakable to anyone who has seen one.
There were two more suicide attacks today, making a total of 130 Iraqi civilians killed in 3 days of suicide attacks. In one of the attacks today, a car drove into a mourning tent at a Shiite funeral and blew up, killing 30. In the attacks at Khanaqin yesterday, two bombers walked into mosques full of worshippers and blew themselves up. None of these attacks would have been possible to stage as non-suicide attacks and fool so many witnesses into thinking they were suicide attacks.
These attacks are not accidents. They are deliberate, intentional targeting of Iraqi civilians by AMZ and AQIZ for a specific purpose. That purpose is to foment war between the Sunnis and Shia and stop the democratic process. It is to the anti-war movement’s great shame that they ignore them or attempt to deflect blame.
I don’t claim to speak for Iraqis. The Iraqis speak for themselves. 63% of them spoke on Oct 15, risking their lives to vote in the constitutional referendum, with 78% of voters approving it.
On December 15, they will speak again, voting for a permanent government. It will be my honor and privilege to witness that event; I leave next week. By next summer, the government and army should be able to stand on their own. Then we will leave and the Iraqis will fully control their own destiny.
You keep talking as if I have hate, contempt, or disdain for the Iraqis. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am in awe of the courage and quiet resolve I have seen by Iraqis determined to rebuild their government despite murderous threats. The restraint the Shia have shown in the face of a relentless campaign of suicide bombings amazes me. In many ways the Iraqi people are better and stronger than Americans. I am not eager to die, but I’m willing to risk my life to give those people a chance to have the government and freedom they deserve. The vast majority of American soldiers feel the same way.
Ed
19 November 2005, 7:51 pmStan:
Ed, why do you keep pointing to the percentages of Iraqis who voted instead of the percentges of Iraqis who want the occupation ended?
And if you don’t want to show contempt for people, don’t write ultimatums, ie, if you want us to leave, then vote….or VOTE, in bold, capital letters like a drill field command.
They want you to leave. Period. You can’t dictate the conditions to them. It’s not fucking George Bush’s country, and it’s not yours either.
Your last sentence is pure poppycock, and even if it were true (it’s not), it’s not how any American feels that matters… unless you frame this as an imperial ‘responsibility.’ White man’s burden?
I remain flabbergasted by the cynical spohistry of your apologies for this war, and by the plain gall of telling someone what the conditions are under which you will leave THEIR home.
We’re getting close to the bone of the matter, though. You believe that the US has the right to direct the futures of anyone they want.
19 November 2005, 9:25 pmEd:
Stan, you continue to misrepresent Iraqi public opinion by misquoting polls. Favoring an end to the occupation is not the same as wanting immediate withdrawal. Nor is wanting an end to the occupation the same as opposing the ongoing political process and resulting government.
I’ve said repeatedly that the occupation should end. But leaving right now, instead of finishing the process we started, is a really stupid and irresponsible idea.
I don’t really care whether you’re flabbergasted or offended. You have no business lecturing anyone on tone. You wear your self-righteousness like a hair shirt and screech at anyone who challenges you. You’ve tried about a dozen times to tell me what I think and why I think it. Stop trying to make every debate about me. Argue the merits of the case, or go sell shoes.
19 November 2005, 11:54 pmStan:
Screech? Shoes? Ed, I’m not lecturing you on “tone”; I’m pointing out the content of your argument. You are the one who issued the colonial ultimatum.
As to the situation there and whether Iraqis favor an immediate end to the occupation:
“Aidan Delgado, a 23-year-old U.S. Army reservist with the 320th Military Police Company told Bob Herbert of the New York Times recently, that he “had witnessed an Army sergeant lashed a group of children with a steel Humvee antenna, and a Marine corporal planted a vicious kick in the chest of a kid about 6 years old”. After he was deployed to Abu Ghraib Prison, Mr. Delgado told Herbert: “The violence [in Abu Ghraib] was sickening, some inmates were beaten nearly to death”. In one of the many detainees’ protests at Abu Ghraib, the “Army authorized lethal force. Four [unarmed] detainees were shot to death”, said Delgado.
“An eyewitness female detainee at Abu Ghraib, who identified herself as ‘Noor’, told Al-Jazeera that ‘U.S. soldiers at Abu Ghraib prison raped women and, in many occasions, forced them to strip naked in public’. She admitted seeing ‘many female detainees got pregnant’. Iraqi lawyer Iman Khamas, of International Occupation Watch Centre, said; “One former detainee had recounted the alleged rape of her cell mate in Abu Ghraib.” “[The detainee] had been raped 17 times in one day”, said Khamas.
“A U.S-sponsored poll in May 2004 shows that 92 per cent of Iraqis viewed the invaders as “occupiers” rather than “liberators”, 85 per cent wanted them to leave immediately, and only 2 per cent (2%) of Iraqis viewed the U.S. as “liberators”. The Washington Post survey revealed that; “Public opinion polls show 80 per cent [of Iraqis] want the Americans out of their country. In the election campaign, one common theme among candidates was the withdrawal of occupying forces”. The Iraqi people have rejected this U.S-imposed form of colonial dictatorship.”
full at http://www.countercurrents.org/iraq-hassan090505.htm
“82 per cent of Iraqis want all occupation forces removed from their country, less than one per cent feel occupation forces have improved security, and 45 per cent openly admitted to feeling that attacks against US forces are justified; the different Iraqi forces which cooperate with the occupation and agreed to take part to the reconciliation conference, issued a joint call to the UN Security Council to extend the mandate of the occupation. Resolution 1546 stated that except on the Iraqi government’s request, the current date for the end of the occupation was set for December 2005. It seems obvious that these forces are not ready to change their policies and respect the Iraqi people’s interests. Although they declared that they are ready to reconcile with the Sunni community of the population, they are currently waging, alongside US forces, an attack of unprecedented scale since the siege of Fallujah in the Al-Anbar province.”
full at http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2005/768/re5.htm
Here’s one from a year and a half ago:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2001927572_iraqpoll13.html
The poll was not framed to put timetables on the demand for withdrawal, but when resistance is this overwhelming with 45% of respondents supporting armed resistance and 85% opposing the occupation, it’s very difficult to infer that these people want the US to “finish the process” when the process involves things like the Guernica treatment visited on places like Fallujah, thousands of random round-ups and detentions, sexual abuse, checkpoint killings, death squads in the guise of US-backed Badr militias, runing over civilians with military vehicles, breaking into their houses in the middle of the night, peppering the entire nation with a radioactive heavy metal, and imposing conditions on the structure of their post-occupation economy.
Again, you are not Iraqi. The US has no right whatsoever to be there at all. The very act of declaring that it is your “responsiblity” to “finish” what is a fundamentally illegal process is the declaration of a dominator, a foreigner imposing his will with a gun, and painting over the dissonances with the claim of white man’s burden (or the cleaned up version, since you have some melanin in the occupying forces).
20 November 2005, 7:58 amEd:
Stan, I accuse you of misrepresenting polls on Iraq, and you respond by … misrepresenting polls on Iraq.
Do you understand the concept of “primary source”? Posting deceptive pieces by leftist opinion websites that selectively report and edit results doesn’t prove squat. Your first 2 links are nothing but misleading editorials.
If you can’t cite the exact poll questions asked, the choices for answers, and demographics of the sample group, you have no business citing a poll. If you ever get in the mood for serious research, here is a good place to start: http://www.iraqanalysis.org/info/55
Let’s take your first link.
The quote is deliberately misleading. There are actually two separate polls being cited. However, no source is provided for the first poll, no data, no questions, no answers, nothing. Which “US sponsored poll in May 2004″ is the author citing?
The Washington post survey mentioned in your first quote is the same poll cited in your third link. Nice touch, citing the same poll twice to confirm itself. That poll did not say that Iraqis want the US out of their country “immediately”; it was merely a relative rating of confidence in various institutions. Here are actual results on the poll from the Post itself:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/world/daily/graphics/iraqipoll_051304.html
Now you’ll try and strawman this by arguing it proves that the coalition is unpopular. But I’ve never argued the coalition is popular or that people want us to stay foever. Stop shifting the debate to strawmen. The question is simple and clear: should the US leave now, or after the completion of the elections and the establishment of a legitimate Iraqi government. Both our positions on that are clear too.
The second poll you cite is the widely reported British secret poll. Again, there is nothing at all in that poll to indicate that Iraqis favor immediate withdrawal. It is never difficult for you to “infer” anything you want, but that’s hardly a persuasive argument.
You don’t care about Iraqi public opinion, except as it supports your position. If you cared, you wouldn’t ignore the widespread Iraqi support for the constitutional process, ratified by 78% of voters. You wouldn’t dismiss the legitimacy of a government elected in a free vote by the Iraqi people, and you wouldn’t label as “collaborators” an army and police force widely supported by the population.
I leave in a week, and I need to spend more time with my family and less time at my computer. This will probably be my last post for 6 months, so goodbye for now. If I can find a computer downrange that allows forum posting, I’ll send you some nice souvenier photos from the elections in December. You know, smiling people with purple fingers: http://www.economist.com/images/20050205/0605MA1.jpg
20 November 2005, 1:30 pmgamal:
Hello all i think this discussion is running out of steam. so i should like to address a related issue, the transformation of america, and i am assuming you can all read between the lines and that i dont need to lay it all out.
Perhaps this currrent project in the mid east will transform it in some way or other, who knows. however what is also happening is the transformation of the US and that can be seen much more clearly and is much more clearly terrifying.
if bill clinton was the first “black” president there is no doubt that GW Bush is americas first “arab” president so completely does he reprise the act of a gulf potentate, his appeals to perverse religious doctrine, the easy recourse to repression and deceit, the nepotism and sense of entilement that his class and allies enjoy, his unreasoning ignorance and the self confidence that is truely ghoulish and inhuman, in short what is being constructed in the US is a new feudalism, we recognise its features because we live it and have done so for a century or so. are there really able bodied young men of the republican and war supporting fraternity who do not sign up in this hour of their armies need despite casting the current issues in terms of a dire threat to the state, how unutterably shameful, how despicable.
the iraq war, the phoney al-quaida insurgency, i mean a new caliphate, please it makes us laugh bin laden was derided as the “disney mujahid” by many, he would have trouble selling raffle tickets with his tired platitudes and meaningless rhetoric. in short though we may be be the instrumental objects of american force you are the real targets, it is the american insurgency that your rulers fear, a new crisis of democracy.
how mwny vets go from the front, to poverty, addiction death or prison in short order.
the democrats confuse us non-americans seeming if anything to be more extreme, (excepting the current administration which seems to be unprecedentedly deranged,) than the average real consrvative.
after watergate it seems that the intent of the powerful in US society is to recreat the passivity of the 50’s (amongst the mainstream of american society)
under which money and consumption are to be everyones primary goals, with god and country providing the drumbeat of an emtional political cadence which in no way provides an avenue for real expression of the political and social needs of the american people, we may be the neo-conservatives far enemy, with whom peace will eventually be possible, you however are the near enemy with whom no peace is either envisaged or indeed possible.
goodnight and thank you all, including Ed for this brief conversation
i remain your devoted friend
20 November 2005, 3:49 pmgkk
ali tehrani:
Hey Stan,
25 November 2005, 3:19 pmremember me? If so, probably not too fondly.
Anyway, I have been reading some of your stuff and find it very interesting. Your spin on Haiti is on the money, I worked for Aristide in 2002-2003 and couldnt agree more. Your views on Iraq differ from mine, I’m here and I see things from a “Persian perspective”, I guess. I was never that good at being American,hahaha!
Well, you will probably never see this anyway.
Take care and stay loud - “il faut de tout pour faire un monde”
Ali
crater_lake:
As I’ve always known - (commissioned) Officers are not to be trusted; they are hapless apologists for power.
1 February 2007, 2:20 am>Don’t call me Sir, I work for a living.