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Thursday, March 27, 2003 |
QUOTE OF THE DAY
"There's a natural mystic floating through the air. And if you listen carefully now you will hear. This could be the first trumpet. Might as well be the last. Many more will have to suffer. Many more will have to die. Don't ask me why. Things are not the way they used to be".
- - Bob Marley
RHINO HERE:
So one week into the shrub & company war plan. Let's take stock:
1) Their Blitzkrieg... uh... sorry... "shock & awe" strategy was to drop thousands of hi-power, hi-tech bombs on Baghdad to kill Saddam & put the fear of the Christian God into those loyal to him so they'd surrender & it'd all be over quickly.
Not only have they apparently not killed Saddam, since he keeps showing up on Iraqi TV, but they haven't even shut down Iraqi TV, save for a few hours after trying to bomb it to smithereens. And the surrendering loyalists seem to be putting up quite a fight even without fighter jets or hi-tech GPS controlled missiles.
2) The hi-tech GPS controlled missiles & other "modern warfare weaponry" was supposed to substantially diminish the number of collateral damage (that means dead noncombatants).
Wednesday a missile landed in a civilian marketplace in Northern Baghdad killing 14 & injuring twice that. But Rumsfeld claimed Saddam's guys were responsible. Would they admit it if they didn't have to? But let's bear in mind the information provided earlier in the week about how new weapons systems must be tested in actual war situation before Lockheed & their ilk can actually get a purchase order from the pentagon. So there's bound to be some misses. Hopefully someone's keeping track of which system was responsible for the marketplace fiasco so they won't buy that one.
3) They're upset about some of the Iraqi's wearing civilian clothes yet bearing arms & using them. Are they calling them irregulars? Shrub's spokespeople (have you gotten a load of Defense Department spokeswoman Victoria Clarke? Chilly! A Rummie student for sure) say it's totally unfair & against the rules of engagement.
Let's be fair folks. If any foreign army invaded the U.S., what self-respecting gun toting American wouldn't be in the streets helping out our "regulars".
I fear all their claims about this being a quick & surgically modern war will turn out to be so much bush-it. Surely that's what the U.S. originally thought about Viet Nam & what the Russians thought about Afghanistan.
Rhino says, "SUPPORT OUR TROOPS! BRING THEM HOME ALIVE!"
Are you frustrated by the in-bed'ed media? Wanna do something about it?
MoveOn's Media Corps is a group of committed online activists who will keep the media accountable. Help make sure that the news media report the war the way it happens, not the way the Bush Administration wishes it would happen. You know MoveOn, right? 1,300,000 strong in the United States alone. (Think of it as one out of every 216 Americans is a MoveOn member.) 750,000 international members. Over two million online activists.
The Media Corps is a new initiative with action ideas that will take less than 15 minutes. But to be part of the Corps they are asking that you commit to taking up to one action per day. The actions could include calling media outlets when they air especially bad coverage, pushing Clear Channel radio to stop censoring anti-war songs, or writing letters to the editor. Sign up at:
http://www.moveon.org/mediacorps/
Don't like bombs? Wanna do something about it?
The United States continues to produce nuclear weapons at the Y-12 "National Security Complex" in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. In an attempt to curb this dangerous threat to global security, this Sunday, March 30th, a citizen inspection team will descend upon this key part of the U.S. Military Industrial Complex to assess US compliance with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
Your presence is requested to participate in this important action. For details, go to: http://www.stopthebombs.org/
Click on "Citizen Weapons Inspection at Y12, then come to Oak Ridge and stand for peace!"
Background - The Department of Energy has unveiled plans for a new "National Security Complex" in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The plans are revealed in the first-ever Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the Y-12 bomb plant. The EIS outlines the first step in the DOE's plans to build a new $4 billion dollar bomb plant, enabling them to do 10 times as much weapons work as current levels and to go into production of new nuclear weapons. Y-12 is the last full scale nuclear weapons production facility in the United States.
7:40:48 AM 
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THE BOTTOM LINE
Another episode of "Know Your Enemy" - Richard N. Perle
Thanks to Democrats.com for the following blurbs & links:
Richard Perle Murders the UN - and Dances On Its Grave
In a seethingly contemptuous UK Guardian article entitled "Thank God for the death of the UN," Richard Perle declares: "Saddam Hussein's reign of terror is about to end. He will go quickly, but not alone: in a parting irony, he will take the UN down with him. Well, not the whole UN. The "good works" part will survive, the low-risk peacekeeping bureaucracies will remain, the chatterbox on the Hudson will continue to bleat. What will die is the fantasy of the UN as the foundation of a new world order. As we sift the debris, it will be important to preserve, the better to understand, the intellectual wreckage of the liberal conceit of safety through international law administered by international institutions." Right-wing Republican regimes led by Reagan and the Bushes worked tirelessly to destroy the UN and to install and maintain murderous pro-American dictators. This article should provoke some very interesting research into Perle's activities...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,918812,00.html
Perle Pimps for China Despite Pentagon Objections
NY Times reports, "Even as he advises the Pentagon on war matters, Richard N. Perle, chairman of the influential Defense Policy Board, has been retained by the telecommunications company Global Crossing to help overcome Defense Department resistance to its proposed sale to a foreign firm... Perle is to be paid $725,000 by the company, including $600,000 if the government approves the sale of the company to a joint venture of Hutchison Whampoa, controlled by the Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing, and Singapore Technologies Telemedia, a phone company controlled by the government of Singapore... [The Pentagon and the FBI oppose the sale] because it would put Global Crossing's worldwide fiber optics network - one used by the United States government - under Chinese ownership." Indict Perle Now!
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/21/business/21GLOB.html
Rep. Conyers Demands Pentagon Investigation of Richard Perle
" 'I am aware of several potential conflicts that warrant your immediate review,' Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) said in a letter to the Pentagon's inspector general... For his work for Global Crossing, Mr. Perle's fee, outlined in papers that the company is preparing to file in as part of a bankruptcy proceeding, is $725,000, including a unusual contingent payment of $600,000 if the company succeeds in obtaining approval to complete the deal... [Conyers also wants an investigation of Perle's work for] Autonomy, a data-mining company that has said its clients include the Defense and Homeland Security Departments... [and] Trireme Partners, a venture capital firm that invests in companies related to national security. In an article about Mr. Perle and Trireme earlier this month in The New Yorker, Seymour Hersh described a January lunch between Mr. Perle and Adnan Kashoggi, the Saudi-born arms dealer... Mr. Perle has threatened to sue The New Yorker in a British court for libel." - NY Times.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/25/business/25GLOB.html
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7:20:03 AM
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© Copyright 2005 Gary Rhine.
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