OUR IMPLODING PRESIDENT: CINDY INTERVIEWED BY TOM

[Zlatko Waterman]

( An interesting insight into our leading antiwar activist's busy life. Cindy Sheehan, whom I admire, speaks plainly, simply and clearly. She can, of course, articulate political positions with Washington types. But she chooses instead to speak the truth.)


Our Imploding President


Tom Engelhardt interviews Cindy Sheehan
Tom Dispatch



My brief immersion in the almost unimaginable life of Cindy Sheehan begins on the Friday before the massive antiwar march past the White House. I take a cab to an address somewhere at the edge of Washington, D.C. – a city I don't know well – where I'm to have a quiet hour with her. Finding myself on a porch filled with peace signs and vases of roses (assumedly sent for Sheehan), I ring the doorbell, only to be greeted by two barking dogs but no human beings. Checking my cell phone, I discover a message back in New York from someone helping Sheehan out. Good Morning America has just called; plans have changed. Can I make it to Constitution and 15th by five? I rush to the nearest major street and, from a bus stop, fruitlessly attempt to hail a cab. The only empty one passes me by and a young black man next to me offers an apologetic commentary: "I hate to say this, but they probably think you're hailing it for me and they don't want to pick me up." On his recommendation, I board a bus, leaping off (20 blocks of crawl later) at the sight of a hotel with a cab stand.

A few minutes before five, I'm finally standing under the Washington monument, beneath a cloud-dotted sky, in front of "Camp Casey," a white tent with a blazing red "Bring them home tour" banner. Behind the tent is a display of banged-up, empty soldiers' boots; and then, stretching almost as far as the eye can see or the heart can feel, a lawn of small white crosses, nearly 2,000 of them, some with tiny American flags planted in the nearby ground. In front of the serried ranks of crosses is a battered-looking metal map of the United States rising off a rusty base. Cut out of it are the letters, "America in Iraq, killed ___, wounded ___." (It's wrenching to note that, on this strange sculpture with eternal letters of air, only the figures of 1,910 dead and 14,700 wounded seem ephemeral, written as they are in white chalk over a smeared chalk background, evidence of numerous erasures.)

This is, at the moment, Ground Zero for the singular movement of Cindy Sheehan, mother of Casey, who was killed in Sadr City, Baghdad, on April 4, 2004, only a few days after arriving in Iraq. Her movement began in the shadows and on the Internet, but burst out of a roadside ditch in Crawford, Texas, and, right now, actually seems capable of changing the political map of America. When I arrive, Sheehan is a distant figure, walking with a crew from Good Morning America amid the white crosses. I'm told by Jodie, a stalwart of Code Pink, the women's antiwar group, in a flamboyant pink-feathered hat, just to hang in there along with Joan Baez, assorted parents of soldiers, vets, admirers, tourists, press people, and who knows who else.

As Sheehan approaches, she's mobbed. She hugs some of her greeters, poses for photos with others, listens briefly while people tell her they came all the way from California or Colorado just to see her, and accepts the literal T-shirt off the back of a man, possibly a vet, with a bandana around his forehead, who wants to give her "the shirt off my back." She is brief and utterly patient. She offers a word to everyone and anyone. At one point, a man shoves a camera in my hand so that he and his family can have proof of this moment – as if Cindy Sheehan were already some kind of national monument, which in a way she is.

But, of course, she's also one human being, even if she's on what the psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton would call a "survivor mission" for her son. Exhaustion visibly inhabits her face. (Later, she'll say to me, "Most people, if they came with me for a day, would be in a coma by 11 a.m.") She wears a tie-dyed, purple T-shirt with "Veterans for Peace" on the front and "waging peace" on the back. Her size surprises me. She's imposing, far taller than I expected, taller certainly than my modest five-feet, six inches. Perhaps I'm startled only because I'd filed her away – despite every strong commentary I'd read by her – as a grieving mother and so, somehow, a diminished creature.

And then, suddenly, a few minutes after five, Jodie is hustling me into the back seat of a car with Cindy Sheehan beside me, and Joan Baez beside her. Cindy's sister Dede, who wears an "Anything war can do, peace can do better" T-shirt and says to me later, "I'm the behind-the-scenes one, I'm the quiet one," climbs into the front seat. As soon as the car leaves the curb, Cindy turns to me: "We better get started."

"Now?" I ask, flustered at the thought of interviewing her under such chaotic conditions. She offers a tired nod – I'm surely the 900th person of this day – and says, "It's the only way it'll happen." And so, with my notebook (tiny printed questions scattered across several pages) on my knees, clutching my two cheap tape recorders for dear life and shoving them toward her, we begin:

TomDispatch: You've said that the failed bookends of George Bush's presidency are Iraq and Katrina. And here we are with parts of New Orleans flooded again. Where exactly do you see us today?

Cindy Sheehan: Well, the invasion of Iraq was a serious mistake, and the invasion and occupation have been seriously mismanaged. The troops don't have what they need. The money's being dropped into the pockets of war profiteers and not getting to our soldiers. It's a political war. Not only should we not be there, it's making our country very vulnerable. It's creating enemies for our children's children. Killing innocent Arabic Muslims, who had no animosity toward the United States and meant us no harm, is only creating more problems for us.

Katrina was a natural disaster that nobody could help, but the man-made disaster afterwards was just horrible. I mean, number one, all our resources are in Iraq. Number two, what little resources we did have were deployed far too late. George Bush was golfing and eating birthday cake with John McCain while people were hanging off their houses praying to be rescued. He's so disconnected from this country – and from reality. I heard a line yesterday that I thought was perfect. This man said he thinks Katrina will be Bush's Monica. Only worse.

TD: It seems logical that the families of dead soldiers should lead an antiwar movement, but historically it's almost unique. I wondered if you had given some thought to why it happened here and now.

CS: That's like people asking me, "Why didn't anybody ever think of going to George Bush's ranch to protest anything?"

TD: I was going to ask you that too…

CS: [Laughs.] I don't know. I just thought of it and went down to do it. It was so serendipitous. I was supposed to go to England for a week in August to do Downing Street [memo] events with [Congressman] John Conyers. That got canceled. I was supposed to go to Arkansas for a four-day convention. That got canceled. So I had my whole month free. I was going to be in Dallas for the Veterans for Peace convention. The last straw was on Wednesday, Aug. 3 – the 14 Marines who were killed and George Bush saying that all of our soldiers had died for a noble cause and we had to honor the sacrifices of the fallen by continuing the mission. I had just had it. That was enough and I had this idea to go to Crawford.

The first day we were there – this is how unplanned it was – we were sitting in lawn chairs, about six of us, underneath the stars with one flashlight between us, and we were going to the bathroom in a 10-gallon bucket.

DeDe: Five-gallon…

CS: A five-gallon bucket, sorry. So that's how well planned this action was. We just planned it as we were going along and, for something so spontaneous, it turned out to be incredibly powerful and successful. It's hard for some people to believe how spontaneous it was.

TD: You've written that George Bush refusing to meet with you was the spark that lit the prairie fire – and that his not doing so reflected his cowardice. You also said that if he had met you that fatal… fateful day…

Joan Baez: Fatal day…

TD: Fatal – it was fatal for him – things might have turned out quite differently.

CS: If he had met with me, I know he would have lied to me. I would have called him on his lies and it wouldn't have been a good meeting, but I would have left Crawford. I would have written about it, probably done a few interviews, but it wouldn't have sparked this exciting, organic, huge peace movement. So he really did the peace movement a favor by not meeting with me.

TD: I thought his fatal blunder was to send out [National Security Advisor Stephen] Hadley and [Deputy White House Chief of Staff Joe] Hagin as if you were the prime minister of Poland. [She laughs.] And it suddenly made you in terms of the media…

CS: …credible.

TD: So what did Hadley and Hagin say to you?

CS: They said, "What do you want to tell the president?" I said, "I want to ask the president, what is the noble cause my son died for?" And they kept telling me: Keep America safe from terrorism for freedom and democracy. Blah-blah-blah… all the excuses I wasn't going to take, except from the President. Then we talked about weapons of mass destruction and the lack thereof, about how they had really believed it. I was: Well, really, Mr. Stephen (Yellowcake Uranium) Hadley… I finally said, "This is a waste of time. I might be a grieving mother, but I'm not stupid. I'm very well informed and I want to meet with the president." And so they said, "Okay, we'll pass on your concerns to the president."

They said at one point, "We didn't come out here thinking we'd change your mind on policy." And I said, "Yes you did." They thought they were going to intimidate me, that they were going to impress me with the high level of administration official they had sent out, and after they explained everything to me, I was going to go [her voice becomes liltingly mocking], "Ohhhh, I really never saw it that way. Okay, let's go guys." You know, that's exactly what they thought they were going to do to me. And I believe it was a move that did backfire because, as you said, it gave me credibility and then, all of a sudden, the White House press corps thought this might be a story worth covering.

TD: What was that like? I had been reading your stuff on the Internet for over a year, but…

CS: I think in progressive circles I was very well known. But all of a sudden I was known all over the world. My daughters were in Europe when my mother had her stroke. My husband and I decided not to tell the girls. We didn't want to ruin their vacation, but they saw it on TV. So it really just spread like wildfire. And not only did it bring wanted attention, it brought unwanted attention from the right-wing media. But that didn't affect me, that didn't harm me at all.

I'd been doing this a long time. I'd been on Wolf Blitzer, Chris Matthews, all those shows. I'd done press conferences. It was just the intensity that spiked up. But my message has always remained the same. I didn't just fall off some pumpkin truck on Aug. 6 and start doing this. The media couldn't believe someone like me could be so articulate and intelligent and have my own message. Number one, I'm a woman; number two, I'm a grieving mother; so they had the urge to marginalize me, to pretend like somebody's pulling my strings. Our president's not even articulate and intelligent. Someone must be pulling his strings, so someone must be pulling Cindy Sheehan's, too. That offended me. Oh my gosh, you think someone has to put words into my mouth! [She laughs.] Do some research!

TD: Did you feel they were presenting you without some of your bluntness?

CS: God forbid anybody speak bluntly or tell the truth. Teresa Heinz Kerry, they marginalized her, too, because she always spoke her mind.

TD: Would you like to speak about your bluntness a little, because words you use like "war crimes" aren't ones Americans hear often.

CS: All you have to do is look at the Nuremberg Tribunal or the Geneva Conventions. Clearly they've committed war crimes. Clearly. It's black and white. It's not me coming up with this abstract idea. It's like, well, did you put a bullet in that person's head or didn't you? "Yes, I did." Well, that's a crime. It's not shades of gray. They broke every treaty. They broke our own Constitution. They broke Nuremberg. They broke the Geneva Conventions. Everything. And if somebody doesn't say it, does it mean it didn't happen? Somebody has to say it, and I'll say it. I've called George Bush a terrorist. He says a terrorist is somebody who kills innocent people. That's his own definition. So, by George Bush's own definition, he is a terrorist, because there are almost 100,000 innocent Iraqis that have been killed. And innocent Afghanis that have been killed.

And I think a lot of the mainstream opposition is glad I'm saying it, because they don't have to say it. They're not strong enough or brave enough or they think they have something politically at stake. We've had Congress members talk about impeachment and war crimes. I've heard them. But they're the usual suspects. They're marginalized, too. They've always been against the war, so we can't listen to them.

You know, I had always admired people like the woman who started Mothers Against Drunk Driving or John Walsh for starting the Adam Walsh Foundation after his son was killed. I thought I could never do anything like that to elevate my suffering or my tragedy, and then, when it happened to me, I found out I did have the strength.

[It's about 5:30 when we pull up at a Hyatt Hotel. Cindy, Dede, and I proceed to the deserted recesses of the hotel's restaurant where Cindy has her first modest meal of the day. The rest of the interview takes place between spoonfuls of soup.]

TD: I've read a lot of articles about you in which your son Casey is identified as an altar boy or an Eagle Scout, but would you be willing to tell me a little more about him?

CS: He was very calm. He never got mad. He never got too wild. One way or the other, he didn't waver much. I have another son and two daughters. He was the oldest one and they just idolized him. He never gave anybody trouble, but he was a procrastinator, the kind of person who, if he had a big project at school, would wait until the day before to do it. But when he had a job – he worked full time before he went into the Army and he was never late for work or missed a day in two years. I think that's pretty amazing. The reason we talk about him being an altar boy was that church was his number one priority, even when he was away from us in the Army. He helped at the chapel. He never missed Mass. He was an usher. He was a Eucharistic minister. When he was at home, he was heavily involved in my youth ministry.

For eight years I was a youth minister at our parish and for three of those years in high school he was in my youth group; then for three of those years in college he helped me.

TD: Tell me about his decision to join the Army.

CS: A recruiter got hold of him, probably at a vulnerable point in his life, promised him a lot of things, and didn't fulfill one of the promises. It was May of 2000. There was no 9/11. George Bush hadn't even happened. When George Bush became his commander-and-chief, my son's doom was sealed. George Bush wanted to invade Iraq before he was even elected president. While he was still governor of Texas he was talking about: "If I was commander-and-chief, this is what I would do."

Back then, my son was promised a $20,000 signing bonus. He only got $4,000 of that when he finished his advanced training. He was promised a laptop, so he could take classes from wherever he was deployed in the world. He never got that. They promised him he could finish college because he only had one year left when he went in the Army. They would never let him take a class. They promised him he could be a chaplain's assistant, which was what he really wanted to do; but, when he got to boot camp, they said that was full and he could be a Humvee mechanic or a cook. So he chose Humvee mechanic. The most awful thing the recruiter promised him was: Even if there was a war, he wouldn't see combat because he scored so high on the ASVAB [Career Exploration] tests. He would only be in war in a support role. He was in Iraq for five days before he was killed in combat.

TD: Did you discuss Iraq with him at all?

CS: Yes, we did. He didn't agree with it. Nobody in our family agreed with it. He said, "I wish I didn't have to go, Mom, but I have to. It's my duty and my buddies are going." I believe we as Americans have every right to, and should be willing to, defend our country if we're in danger. But Iraq had nothing to do with keeping America safe. So that's why we disagreed with it. He reenlisted after the invasion of Iraq, because he was told if he didn't, he'd have to go to Iraq anyway – he'd be stop-lossed – but if he did, he'd get to choose a new MOS [military specialty] when he got home.

TD: Can you tell me something about your own political background?

CS: I've always been a pretty liberal Democrat, but I don't think this issue is partisan. I think it's life and death. Nobody asked Casey what political party he belonged to before they sent him to die in an unjust and immoral war.

TD: You met with Hillary Clinton yesterday, didn't you? What do you think generally of the Democratic… well, whatever it is?

CS: They've been very weak. I think Kerry lost because he didn't come out strong against the war. He came out to be even more of a nightmare than George Bush. You know, we'll put more troops in; I'll hunt down terrorists; I'll kill them! That wasn't the right thing to say. The right thing to say was: This war was wrong; George Bush lied to us; people are dead because of it; they shouldn't be dead; and if I'm elected, I'll do everything to get our troops home as soon as possible. Then, instead of seeing the failure Kerry was with his middle-of-the-road, wishy-washy, cowardly policies, the rest of the Democrats have just kept saying the same things.

Howard Dean came out and said he hopes that the president is successful in Iraq. What's that mean? How can somebody be successful when we have no goals or defined mission or objectives to achieve there? They've been very cowardly and spineless. What we did at Camp Casey was give them some spine. The doors are open to them, Democrats and Republicans alike. As [former Congressman and Win Without War Director] Tom Andrews said, if they won't see the light, they'll feel the heat. And I think they're feeling the heat.

I can see it happening. I can see some Republicans like Chuck Hagel and Walter Jones breaking ranks with the party line. We met with a Republican yesterday – I don't want to say his name because I don't want to scare him off – but he seems to be somebody we can work with. Of course, as it gets closer to the congressional elections, we'll be letting his constituents know that he can be worked with.

TD: So you're planning to go into the elections as a force?

CS: It's totally about the war, about their position on the war. If people care about that issue, then that's what they should make it about too. We're starting a "Meet with the Moms" campaign. We're going to target every single congressman and senator to show their constituents exactly where they stand on the war. People in the state of New York, for instance, should look at their senators and say, if you don't come out for bringing our troops home as soon as possible, we're not going to reelect you.

TD: Did Hillary give you any satisfaction at all?

CS: Her position is still to send in more troops and honor the sacrifices of the fallen, which sounds like a Bush position, but the dialogue was open.

TD: Don't you think it's strange, these politicians like [Senator] Joe Biden, for example, who talk about sending in more troops, even though we all know there are no more troops?

CS: Yes… Where you gettin' 'em? Where you gettin' 'em? It's crazy. I mean we're going to send more troops in there and leave our country even more vulnerable? Leave us open for attack somewhere else, or to be attacked by natural and man-made disasters again?

TD: You want the troops out now. Bush isn't about to do that, but have you thought about how you would proceed if you could?

CS: When we say now, we don't mean that they can all come home tomorrow. I hope everybody knows that. We have to start by withdrawing our troops from the cities, bringing them to the borders and getting them out. We have to replace our military with something that looks Arabic, something that looks Iraqi, to rebuild their country. You know, they have the technology, they have the skills, but they don't have any jobs right now. How desperate for a job does one have to be to stand in line to apply to the Iraqi National Guard? I mean, they're killed just standing in line! Give the Iraqis as much help and support as they need to rebuild their country, which is in chaos. When our military presence leaves, a lot of the violence and insurgency will die. There will be some regional struggles with the different communities in Iraq, but that's happening right now. The British put together a country that should never have been put together. Maybe it should be split into three different countries – who knows? But that's up to them, not us.

TD: And what do you actually expect? We have three and a half more years of this administration…

CS: No, we don't! [She chuckles.] I think Katrina's going to be his Monica. It's not a matter of "if" any more, it's a matter of "when," because clearly… clearly, they're criminals. I mean, look at the people who got the first no-bid contracts to clean up and rebuild New Orleans. It's Halliburton again. It's crazy. One negative effect of Camp Casey was it took a lot of heat off Karl Rove for his hand in the [Valerie] Plame case. But I hear indictments are coming down soon. So that's one way it's going to come about. George Bush is getting ready to implode. I mean have you seen him lately? He's a man who's out of control.

[Note: For those who would like to read Cindy Sheehan in her own words, or more about her, check out her archive at LewRockwell.com, or go to the Truthout Web site, which has been carrying her latest statements and has extensive coverage on her, or visit AfterDowningStreet.com, which offers thorough, up-to-date coverage of her activities and much else.]

Copyright 2005 TomDispatch

[Zlatko Waterman]

(. . .and as a little companion piece, this witty essay by Margaret Carlson. It goes nicely with the line Cindy uses: "Katrina is George's Monica" .):



Published on Thursday, September 29, 2005 by Bloomberg.com



Bush's Presidency Is Exposed, Crumbling
by Margaret Carlson

Back in the days when President George W. Bush preferred his endles summer at the ranch to storm chasing, few mistakes stuck to him. He was like the guy who drove through the car wash with his top down but never got wet.

No weapons of mass destruction in a country we're stuck in? Well, you must understand, he really thought they were there. At this year's White House Correspondents' Association dinner, Bush showed a video of himself pretending to look for the weapons under his desk.

Oh what a difference a hurricane makes. Katrina exposed something we couldn't know before: Bush's claim that he would keep us safer than that wishy-washy senator from squishy Massachusetts is false. Not only are we not safer than we were before Bush took office, we're worse off.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency, as its Katrina response made tragically clear, is a mess. The Department of Homeland Security, which Bush built from scratch, is mainly known for a color chart, wasteful spending, a mixed bag of airport screeners and a new chief who didn't know the New Orleans Superdome was filled with starving, homeless hurricane victims.

Duct Tape Defense

Here in Washington, there's no feasible evacuation plan. If terrorists struck, the president and vice president would helicopter out. The rest of us -- and that includes many members of Congress -- would be stuck.

I picture myself with duct tape and Saran Wrap, huddling in the basement or in a VW with a leaking sunroof idling for hours on the 14th Street Bridge.

The White House press, which laughed at Bush's video, has been rightly chastised for turning out pool reports on what the president is wearing, eating or chopping. Now they're pounding away at his multiple fuel-squandering trips to hurricane-stricken regions where he can repair little but himself.

A pool report on Sept. 26, the day Bush discovered energy conservation and suggested we all forgo non-essential driving, detailed the gas-sucking trip he took that evening to dinner five blocks away from the White House, commandeering five sport- utility vehicles, four vans and two limousines that kept their motors running for the duration of the meal.

Brown's Lament

Until recently, Bush's attitude toward governing -- it's easy, don't sweat the small stuff, do it on the cheap -- was tolerated, if not admired.

Why not pick Michael Brown, a guy who knows a guy, even to run a life-or-death agency like FEMA? Why not, after he screws up big time, praise him? Why not, after you finally ease him out, keep paying him as a consultant?

At the Kabuki hearings two days ago that pretended to get to the bottom of the fiasco, Republicans who'd been given the word by Karl Rove to concentrate on scapegoating and Swift-Boating Louisiana's Democratic Governor Kathleen Blanco were shocked by Brown's arrogance.

Brown said faith-based institutions, not FEMA, were supposed to help low-income people and that he warned folks higher up the food chain that FEMA was ``emaciated.'' In one Rodney King moment, he said everything would have been fine if only Louisiana officials had all gotten along.

It didn't work. When Republican Christopher Shays, off Rove's script, said he was glad Brown was gone, Brown whined, ``I guess you want me to be this superhero that is going to step in there and suddenly take everybody out of New Orleans.''

And Now DeLay

The unmasking of Brown may force Bush to withdraw the nomination of another pal of a pal to head up a crucial agency, Immigration and Naturalization. Pre-hurricane, Julie Myers, General Richard Myers's niece and the wife of the chief of staff of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, would have sailed through.

It wouldn't have mattered before, but now her non-relevant experience working on Bill Clinton's impeachment and her lack of relevant experience working on immigration may hold her up.

In the realm of when it rains, it pours, other pillars of Bush's carefully constructed world are crumbling. The latest is Tom DeLay, the majority leader who yesterday was indicted for campaign contributions that helped give Bush four more Republicans in the House of Representatives.

Even Bush's hand-picked Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist wouldn't be taking quite such a pummeling if his sale of stock in his family founded HCA Inc. had happened during Bush's glory days. Both the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission are investigating.

Lights Out

Frist, who always contended he didn't even know if his blind trust held HCA stock, had an imminent need to sell what he didn't know he owned just before its price fell almost 10 percent this summer. He may not be Martha Stewart, but his new-found desire, after two terms in office, to avoid a conflict of interest when he considers health-care legislation no longer gets a pass.

When your mojo fades, little things mean a lot. Two days ago, White House press spokesman Scott McClellan said the president is so gung-ho on saving energy (this after a previous spokesman said Bush's answer to the prospect of energy conservation was a ``big N-O''), he's personally reminding staff ``to turn off lights and printers and copiers and computers when they leave the office.''

Someone should remind the president of an earlier chief executive whose decline was hastened when he made a point of turning down the thermostat and donning a cardigan. When you elevate the trivial to policy because the meaningful stuff has gotten away from you, someone will soon be turning the lights out for you.

Margaret Carlson, who was a columnist and deputy Washington bureau chief for Time magazine, is a columnist for Bloomberg News.
© 2005 Bloomberg L.P.

[whimsicaldeb]

thanks Z ~ great stuff

[jimboloco]

TD: Did you discuss Iraq with him at all?

CS: Yes, we did. He didn't agree with it. Nobody in our family agreed with it. He said, "I wish I didn't have to go, Mom, but I have to. It's my duty and my buddies are going."

Ya can't wait for the buddies to refuse duty.
Ya got to do it alone. There will be other buddies on down the line and with a supportive family, geez. So he was a sacrifice, as it were, his only redemption his mom. There is also division within his surviving family. When you step outa line, there will be lonely times.

Unfortunately I am not hearing a big hue and cry against Bushco, not from the mainstream. His presiduncy is a shambles as we see it, but he is above all of us, you know that. Now his new croney legal council as the next Supreme Court nominee. Talk of even a number of Democratic senators who dig her. Come on, this man is in a power grid, stocks are going up.

But, of course, she's also one human being, even if she's on what the psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton would call a "survivor mission" for her son. Exhaustion visibly inhabits her face.

I will be reading your article later today, have an in-service deal to do at hospital this morning, thanks for this post. Like the personal touch in this one.

[stilltrucking]

Good copy Z thanks just one thing wrong

The British put together a country that should never have been put together. Maybe it should be split into three different countries – who knows? But that's up to them, not us.

Iraq was put together in 1920 as a result of the Treaty Of Versailles

TD: You met with Hillary Clinton yesterday, didn't you? What do you think generally of the Democratic… well, whatever it is?

TD: Did Hillary give you any satisfaction at all?

CS: Her position is still to send in more troops and honor the sacrifices of the fallen, which sounds like a Bush position, but the dialogue was open.

So Hilary has a compliant personality. Like Lynde England

Saddam Hussein Would
Still Be in Power if
Barbara Boxer Had
Her Way…

http://www.howardforsenate.com/Documents/Saddam.asp

Hillary is bullshit
Barbara is the real deal






Pete Seger...Change Viet Nam to Iraq (IF YOU LOVE YOUR UNCLE SAM) BRING THEM HOME
If you love your Uncle Sam, Bring them home, bring them home. Support our boys in Vietnam, Bring them home, bring them home.
It'll make our generals sad, I know, Bring them home, bring them home. They want to tangle with the foe, Bring them home, bring them home.
They want to test their weaponry, Bring them home, bring them home. But here is their big fallacy, Bring them home, bring them home.
I may be right, I may be wrong, Bring them home, bring them home. But I got a right to sing this song, Bring them home, bring them home.
There's one thing I must confess, Bring them home, bring them home. I'm not really a pacifist, Bring them home, bring them home.
If an army invaded this land of mine, Bring them home, bring them home. You'd find me out on the firing line, Bring them home, bring them home.
Even if they brought their planes to bomb, Bring them home, bring them home. Even if they brought helicopters and napalm, Bring them home, bring them home.
Show those generals their fallacy: Bring them home, bring them home. They don't have the right weaponry, Bring them home, bring them home.
For defense you need common sense, Bring them home, bring them home. They don't have the right armaments, Bring them home, bring them home.
The world needs teachers, books and schools, Bring them home, bring them home. And learning a few universal rules, Bring them home, bring them home.
So if you love your Uncle Same, Bring them home, bring them home. Support our boys in Vietnam, Bring them home, bring them home.
Words and Music by Pete Seeger © 1966 Storm King Music, Inc.
Posted by: tonid at October 8, 2004 08:36 PM
Here's the link to Congressman Tim Rayn's speech on the floor of the House on Tuesday
http://recap.fednet.net/archive/Buildas ... &sExpire=1
If that does not work got to
http://timryan.house.gov/HoR/OH17/Hidde ... eeches.htm
and click on the first link labeled "Congessman Ryan explains why some people believe the Bush Administration has plans to re-institute a military draft. (October 5, 2004)"

[Zlatko Waterman]

Good postings, Still, and good sentiment.

The Treaty of Versailles generated a "class A mandate" ( a sort of custodial political entity and set of regulations) for Great Britain as a provision of the Treaty's re-allocation of power and influence in the Middle East after WWI.

The sovereign states themselves under A and B mandates were not, in most cases, formed until after 1949.

Here is a brief summary of British influence in the formation of Iraq under its class A mandate:

( paste)

At the Cairo Conference of 1921, the British set the parameters for Iraqi political life that were to continue until the 1958 revolution; they chose a Hashemite, Faisal ibn Husayn, son of Sherif Hussein ibn Ali former Sharif of Mecca as Iraq's first King; they established an indigenous Iraqi army; and they proposed a new treaty. To confirm Faisal as Iraq's first monarch, a one-question plebiscite was carefully arranged that had a return of 96 percent in his favor. The British saw in Faisal a leader who possessed sufficient nationalist and Islamic credentials to have broad appeal, but who also was vulnerable enough to remain dependent on their support. Faisal traced his descent from the family of the Prophet Muhammad. His ancestors held political authority in the holy cities of Mecca and Medina since the tenth century. The British believed these credentials would satisfy traditional Arab standards of political legitimacy; moreover, the British thought Faisal would be accepted by the growing Iraqi nationalist movement because of his role in the 1916 Arab Revolt against the Turks, his achievements as a leader of the Arab emancipation movement, and his general leadership qualities.

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So, it is not technically incorrect to say that " . . .the British put together a country . . ." since the Class A mandate under the Treaty of Versailles gave Iraq's future to the British by putting the Brits in a full custodial role for the formation of modern Iraq. That is, if what you mean by "put together" is that the British executed their mandate under the Treaty of Versailles.

I think the expression "put together" here refers simply to the chief and central role played by the British under the Class A mandate, since the Treaty of Versailles and its "mandates" left the historical situation open to British determination at the time ( 1919-1921).

One frequently hears ( as I did recently from Seymour Hersh) that the British " laid a map down on a table and drew a line around the future Iraq . . .", but of course, in fact, the negotiations, proclamations and gerrymandering of power, including all the deals cut with Faisal and his associates, were far more complicated.

Many arguments remain, of course, about whether the British decisions regarding Iraq were wise and just. For that matter, many arguments remain about the wisdom and justice of the Treaty of Versailles.

World War II was part of the Nazi answer to questions about the Treaty's justice and legitimacy.



--Z

A full ( "answers.com") article, which is clearly and concisely written, can be found here:


http://www.answers.com/topic/british-mandate-of-iraq

[jimboloco]

I like Cindy's forthrightness. Her damnation of the wimpy Democratic big wigs as insubstantial is especially clear.

There needs to be a stronger showdown lowdown. I still contemplate the Florida vote of 2000. Nobody can convince me that we gave the election to Bush with our 90,000 votes cast for Nader. In synchronicity with the rejection of thousands of votes in heavily Democratic West Palm Beach, etc, the refusal to allow for a complete re-assessment of those disputed ballots, all together. Noone envisioned clearly how difficult this Bush term would be, coming from the arguments I remember from the Democrats at the time.

We are still faced with the same dilemma. Vote for a wimpy assed centrist-pseudo liberal and hope for a defeat of the imperial elite,
or continue to sustain a strong rejection of those policies.

[hester_prynne]

I dig Cindy and what she is doing. She's the bravest of all if you ask me, and just think, all she's doing is speaking the truth in the faces of liars.
Wow. What a crime!

h