The Osterley Times

Tuesday, April 08, 2008

Secret US plan for military future in Iraq

The Guardian have been passed a document marked "secret" and "sensitive" which sets out US plans for an open-ended military presence in Iraq.

The draft strategic framework agreement between the US and Iraqi governments, dated March 7, is intended to replace the current UN mandate in Iraq and authourises the US to "conduct military operations in Iraq and to detain individuals when necessary for imperative reasons of security" without time limit.

The authorisation is described as "temporary" and the agreement says the US "does not desire permanent bases or a permanent military presence in Iraq". But the absence of a time limit or restrictions on the US and other coalition forces - including the British - in the country means it is likely to be strongly opposed in Iraq and the US.

Iraqi critics point out that the agreement contains no limits on numbers of US forces, the weapons they are able to deploy, their legal status or powers over Iraqi citizens, going far beyond long-term US security agreements with other countries. The agreement is intended to govern the status of the US military and other members of the multinational force.

Once again it appears that the Bush administration are attempting to tie the next US government's hands when it comes to Iraq, by coming to an arrangement that looks, to all intents and purposes, like a treaty.

Nor is this arrangement likely to be well received by Iraqis.

One well-placed Iraqi Sunni political source said yesterday: "The feeling in Baghdad is that this agreement is going to be rejected in its current form, particularly after the events of the last couple of weeks. The government is more or less happy with it as it is, but parliament is a different matter."

Nor has this arrangement gone down well with Democrats in Washington:

It is also likely to prove controversial in Washington, where it has been criticised by Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, who has accused the administration of seeking to tie the hands of the next president by committing to Iraq's protection by US forces.

The defence secretary, Robert Gates, argued in February that the planned agreement would be similar to dozens of "status of forces" pacts the US has around the world and would not commit it to defend Iraq. But Democratic Congress members, including Senator Edward Kennedy, a senior member of the armed services committee, have said it goes well beyond other such agreements and amounts to a treaty, which has to be ratified by the Senate under the constitution.

Administration officials have conceded that if the agreement were to include security guarantees to Iraq, it would have to go before Congress. But the leaked draft only states that it is "in the mutual interest of the United States and Iraq that Iraq maintain its sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence and that external threats to Iraq be deterred. Accordingly, the US and Iraq are to consult immediately whenever the territorial integrity or political independence of Iraq is threatened."

It will be interesting the hear what General Petraeus has to say about this when he faces the three presidential candidates later on today. I feel sure the subject will be raised.

After all, as the UN mandate doesn't run out until the end of the year, which also brings to end Bush's time in office, why isn't Bush leaving it to the next president to work out his or her arrangements for what they would like to do with Iraq?

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Monday, April 07, 2008

McCain: Tolerance.

McCain has a new web ad which calls for tolerance in the forthcoming election. I wonder if he'll stick to this. For I notice that he gives himself a rather large out. For example, he says that we deserve each others respect, "as long as our character and sincerity merit respect".

The Republicans always attack the character of their democratic rival as they prefer to talk about character and sincerity rather than policy, as they are usually trying to get most Americans to vote against their own economic interests.

So, whilst promising a campaign which "respects" his rival, McCain has given himself squeeze room to attack things like Obama's attendance of Reverend Wright's church, as he will claim that this goes to heart of Obama's "character." So he's not promising us very much that's different at all.

Farms raided as Mugabe incites racial tension

This is a script that we have all read before. Mugabe has now dispatched his war veterans to go to the houses of any remaining whites in Zimbabwe and to tell them that they have four hours to leave their homes, which implies that the whole exercise is state sanctioned, especially as state TV is following them as they do this and filming their actions.

The opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) warned that it might boycott a second round of elections because it would lead Zimbabweans "to the slaughter" of a wave of government-sponsored violence.

It is instead taking legal action to force the state election commission to immediately release results from the presidential election, held nine days ago, which the MDC says will show that its candidate, Morgan Tsvangirai, won outright with 50.3% of the vote, making a run-off election unnecessary. The high court is expected to rule on the petition today.

It is astonishing that nine days after the election Mugabe has still refused to publish the results.

Writing in today's Guardian, Tsvangirai calls on Britain, the US and South Africa to come to the defence of democracy in Zimbabwe. He said Zanu-PF was withholding the election results and planning a violent second round campaign in an attempt to maintain its "untenable grip on power".

Britain and the US can do very little other than issue words of condemnation, which carry very little weight amongst Zimbabweans as a result of Britain's colonial past. South Africa are uniquely positioned to have an impact on this situation but Mbeki has always shown himself to be reluctant to intervene. He, more than anyone else, has allowed Mugabe to get away with this stuff.

The war veterans are going round giving notice to farmers to get off immediately. They've been taking over equipment and livestock and telling the farmers their time is up. This thing can quickly get out of control if it's not dealt with," he said. "Why was the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation there to film the threats to the farmer? You can see this thing is orchestrated."

Chanting war veterans, some of them beating drums, also threatened farmers in Centenary, where the owners were given hours to leave.

There were also signs of renewed pressure on the opposition. Prosper Mutseyami, a newly elected opposition MP from Manicaland, said the police were arresting MDC election agents there. "Nine of our agents were beaten up by the police and then arrested for behaviour likely to provoke a breach of the peace," he said.

In a sign that the government intends again to make white farmers an election issue, the justice minister, Patrick Chinamasa, a Zanu-PF hardliner, claimed the MDC was bringing exiled farmers back in to Zimbabwe ready to reclaim their land.

"The MDC claim they have won and they are unleashing former white farmers on farms occupied by new farmers to reverse the land reform programme," he said. "Their intention is to destabilise the country into chaos over the land issue."

There was a time when such arguments - about returning white farmers - might have worked in any forthcoming election, but with inflation running at over 100,000%, most Zimbabweans will realise that there is no-one waiting at the borders keen to join Zimbabwe's economic nightmare.

The countryside has turned on Mugabe and it will be well nigh impossible for him the ever get them back. They know who is responsible, and it's not the remaining 300 white framers.

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Sunday, April 06, 2008

McCain Wrong on Iraq Ceasefire

God, he's simply too stupid to ever become the President. He thinks Maliki won in Basra. He's claiming that al Sadr brokered the ceasefire, and citing that as evidence of al Sadr's defeat, when everyone knows that it was Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government who brokered the ceasefire.

Why do the press keep giving this guy the benefit of the doubt and claiming that he's on top of foreign policy issues? When he so clearly is not...

John Ashcroft Calls Obama... WHAT????

I think this is a genuine slip of the tongue. Ashcroft looks mortified the minute he realises what he has said.

Obama: Bush's philosophy is "You're on your own".

Democratic battle hands McCain lead

November brings an election which should see a Democrat stroll into the White House, but the polls are saying that the increasingly bitter battle between the defeated Hillary Clinton and the man who will challenge John McCain in November, Barack Obama, is giving McCain an unexpected boost in the polls.

The shift can partly be put down to the bloody fight in the Democratic party over the past month since Clinton's surprise comeback victories in Texas and Ohio. 'No Democrats are holding [McCain] to account right now. He is free to do what he wants and he is getting a boost from that,' said Professor Seth Masket, a political scientist at the University of Denver and a former official in the Clinton White House.
At the same time McCain has launched a well co-ordinated effort to unite his party, raise funds and sell himself to the US public as a likeable war hero who is strong on national security. TV and web ads are already running, showing stills of McCain lying wounded in a hospital bed after being tortured in Vietnam.

Such tactics show how the Republicans are already fighting the general election, while the Democrats are still hotly debating their nomination process. McCain spent the past week on a national tour of America dubbed 'The Service to America Tour', which took in half a dozen cities the Republican has lived in, from Florida to Arizona. The trip generated lots of local TV news coverage in key battleground states.

Such stage-managed coverage is in marked contrast to the tone of the Democratic debate.

While McCain is doing all this Clinton is attacking Obama as unfit for office and threatening to take the Democratic battle all the way to the convention floor in Denver.

It really is time that someone intervened and stopped her in her tracks. She has virtually no chance of gaining the nomination and is now handing an advantage to John McCain.

If the Democratic race is still undecided by the time of the Denver convention in late August, then McCain will have had more than four months of having the national field to himself. Such a time frame will allow him to continue cementing a positive image in the public mind.

This is the real danger posed by Clinton's behaviour, as she continues to cling on when all the numbers MUST tell her that she has lost.

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Mugabe party demands poll recount

Mugabe is demanding that the votes be recounted in the Zimbabwean election for president before they have even been released.

The state-run Sunday Mail newspaper said the governing Zanu-PF party requested a recount because there had been "errors and miscalculations". "Consequent to the anomalies, the party has also requested that the commission defer the announcement of the presidential election result," it added.

I suppose this crap was to be totally expected as the old tyrant seeks to cling to power.

According to papers submitted to the ZEC by Zanu-PF, the number of votes for Mr Mugabe recorded at a number of polling stations were reduced before being sent on to electoral officials.
Some ZEC officials working in the Midlands constituencies of Mberengwa East, West, North and South had since been arrested, the Sunday Mail said.
"As will soon become apparent, the constituency elections officer and his team committed errors of miscounting that are so glaring as to prejudice not just our clients' candidate but also his co-contestants," Zanu-PF's letter said, according to the Sunday Mail.
"There can be no doubt that the entire results of the presidential election in Mberengwa's four constituencies are grossly irregular and cannot stand up to scrutiny," it added.

Okay, so we have the first admission that Mugabe actually lost the election, as Zanu-PF are now claiming that an election which was run while they were in charge of the government was rigged against them.

The results have yet to be released but they are obviously not good for Mugabe, which is why his thugs have been sent on to Zimbabwe's streets.

Meanwhile South Africa's president Mbeki has arrived in London. It is hard to overstate just how ineffective and useless Mbeki has been over the past few years, persistently refusing to issue any criticism of Mugabe's regime and refusing to partake in any kind of intervention.

And from what he's been saying since he got here we can expect more of the same from Mbeki.

Mr Mbeki came to Britain for the Progressive Governance summit of centre left leaders which ended on Saturday.
Speaking about Zimbabwe at the close of the conference in Watford, he said: "The situation for now is manageable.
"It is time to wait. Let's see the outcome of the election results. If there is a re-run of the presidential election let us see what comes out of that."
He defended how the disputed elections have been conducted so far and said the delay in announcing the result of the presidential ballot was due to the lengthy verification process put in place by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission.

It's always time to wait with Mbeki, and the fact that he is defending the length of time it has taken to even release the results of the election, tells you all that you need to know about this ineffectual little man.

Part of the reason that Mugabe has managed to survive so long is because his neighbours play along, terrified of being seen as puppets of the UK, which is one of Mugabe's most constant charges.

The PM [Gordon Brown] said if there was a run-off between Mr Mugabe and Mr Tsvangirai, international observers should be in place to ensure it was fair.
"We are monitoring the situation closely. I think the important thing is that the results have got to be published. They cannot be any longer delayed. They have got to be seen to fair," he said.
Foreign Secretary David Miliband said the UN Security Council was united in wanting the results announced.

It's appalling that Mugabe can get away with shit like this, but when his neighbours turn a blind eye and refuse to condemn him he is able to claim that the evil Brits are trying to destabilise his country.

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Saturday, April 05, 2008

McCain claims he didn't know who MLK was when he was 47 years old.

Is this remotely believable? When he voted against MLK day he was 47 years old. How can someone run for Congress and not know who Martin Luther King was?

On the anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King's death...

...Obama reminds everyone that the enemy is still economic inequality.

Party leaders back Obama as Clinton's funds dwindle

Howard Dean asked that super delegates step up to the plate and bring to an end Hillary's threat to take this election all the way to the convention floor, and the signs are that the super delegates are certainly leaning in that direction, even if they are so far not declaring.

At the same time, more and more super-delegates – the Democratic Party bosses who hold the balance of power in the nomination process – have backed Barack Obama or indicated that they intend to do so in the weeks ahead.

Prominent figures such as former president Jimmy Carter have all but declared for Mr Obama.

"My children and their spouses are pro-Obama. My grandchildren are also pro-Obama," Mr Carter told a Nigerian newspaper while in Africa. "As a super-delegate, I would not disclose who I am rooting for, but I leave you to make that guess."

There are also stories in the press which indicate that Hillary's war chest is becoming increasingly bare.

Mr Obama's fundraising continues to outpace that of Mrs Clinton, and he is now outspending her in political advertising by a rate of more than two to one in Pennsylvania, and doing better in the polls as a result.

The latest New York Times national poll indicates that Mr Obama has maintained a narrow lead of 46 per cent to 43 per cent over Mrs Clinton. But the survey also shows that his support among Democrats has grown weaker over the past month as the crisis over his controversial former pastor reached fever pitch. Men and upper-income voters have taken an increasingly dim view of Mr Obama since his surge of victories in February.

The poll found that Mr Obama's popularity rating since those successes has dropped by seven points, to 62 per cent.

But the fall is nowhere near the collapse that the Clinton campaign was hoping for as it seeks to make the case that Mr Obama is unelectable.

The poll reveals that 56 per cent of Democratic primary voters say he can beat the Republican John McCain in November, compared to just 32 per cent who think Mrs Clinton is the more electable.

Hillary set out to portray Obama as unelectable and, as I feared, did not succeed in doing so, but did succeed in damaging the probable democratic nominee. This is why many people will find it very hard to ever forgive Clinton for the kind of campaign which she fought, concentrating on attacking Obama much more than McCain.

There have also been people like Taylor Marsh, who have applauded Clinton whilst she tore the Democratic party apart. It will be very hard to ever listen to her again and to forgive and forget what she has supported.

For this was not simply an attempt to elect their own candidate. It has long been clear that Hillary had no way of overcoming what even her supporters called "the maths problem". So they set out to destroy Obama as the only way they could see of obtaining victory.

It was a truly disgusting spectacle. And even now, with the super delegates indicating that they will vote against her, there is no sure sign that Hillary will accept her inevitable defeat and withdraw.

She has long put her personal ambition before the good of the party, and there is no indication that this will stop anytime soon. Or that her insane supporters will ever concede that the game is up.

This is from a heated exchange which took place between Howard Dean and Clinton supporters during the recent meeting on Fifth Avenue in which Clinton's people argued that Dean had been too soft on the issue of Michigan and Florida:

Here’s how one attendee, a Dean sympathizer, reconstructed Dean’s riposte to Nemazee: “You've been blunt with me, now let me blunt with you: people say they want leadership if it favors their argument and their candidate. You can't change the rules right now to do what you want without it seeming unfair to the other side."

Dean’s point, the attendee said, was that the most important thing for the party was that the loser feel that he or she had lost fairly, so that when it came time to rally around the nominee, the loser's donors would have no reservations about helping fund the campaign and the DNC.

After his response, Dean received applause -- primarily, one would suspect, from the Obama supporters in the room.

The Clinton side have lost the debate and have lost the election. The only real question left is when are they going to accept their defeat. And how much damage are they going to cause before they do so?

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Mugabe ready to contest run-off

It's not looking good in Zimbabwe. All indications are that Mugabe will now seek a second ballot over the presidency, a ballot that will probably be mired in violence.

Robert Mugabe and hardliners in the ruling Zanu-PF party decided yesterday to contest a run-off presidential vote if there is no outright winner from last week's election, raising fears of a bloody fight to the finish by Zimbabwe's president.

A week after the presidential election there is still no sign of the official results being released, raising suspicions that the election commission is waiting for political direction on whether the final count should make a run-off necessary.

The MDC claims that its candidate, Morgan Tsvangirai, won an outright victory with more than 50% of the vote based on polling station returns. However, the party said it was prepared to contest a second round and would "crush" Mugabe, who took only four out of 10 votes in last week's election, according to its count.

But the MDC said it feared that the campaign would be marked by war veterans and Zanu-PF militias unleashing violence and intimidation against MDC supporters, which was absent before last week's vote but a widespread tactic in previous elections. "I think a second round will be bloody," said Theresa Makone, a newly elected MDC MP. "People will be bludgeoned into submission."

It is obvious from the lack of published results that Mugabe has lost the election, and one had hoped that a lear jet leaving Zimbabwe with Mugabe on board was the way this situation was going to resolve itself. Sadly, it looks like the old bastard is going to see this through to the finishing line, with all the violence and intimidation that has epitomised his time in power once again becoming evident.

Hundreds of war veterans marched through Harare yesterday and vowed to "defend the country's sovereignty", taken to be a warning to the opposition, who are accused of being "British puppets" intending to return farms to their white former owners. "The election has been seen as a way to reopen the invasion of our people by whites," said the veterans' militant leader, Jabulani Sibanda. "A good number of white people have been seen proclaiming victory for their candidate Morgan Tsvangirai."

Zanu-PF's administration secretary, Didymus Mutasa, said a five-hour meeting of the party's politburo endorsed the run-off. He declined to give details but the leadership has been divided since a meeting of Mugabe's security cabinet on Sunday night decided not to admit defeat.

Mutasa also accused the MDC of bribing electoral officials and said Zanu-PF would challenge the results in 16 seats in the lower house of parliament, enough to overturn the MDC's six-seat majority which offered the prospect of an end to 28 years of Zanu-PF control.

Results trickling in for the 60 seats in the largely ceremonial upper house of parliament, the senate, give Zanu-PF 21 seats to a total of 22 for two MDC factions.

There is no way that Mugabe can win any second ballot without violence, intimidation and blatant electoral rigging, but he's apparently going to go for it anyway.

One gets the feeling that for the past six days the Zanu-PF have been winded by the results, which is why they have been so silent, and that they have now regrouped and decided on their battle plans.

Sadly for everyone they have decided to battle on, against the will of the Zimbabwean people, and they will now do everything in their power to overturn the democratic wishes of the people of Zimbabwe.

It's the worst possible outcome. This will end in tears.

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Friday, April 04, 2008

Torture was "green lighted" from the top. The president ordered torture.

It's exactly what any sentient person paying attention always knew. Torture was an official policy, it was not something which occurred because of "a few bad apples". Bush and Rumsfeld should be in jail for what they have done.

81% in Poll Say Nation Is Headed on the Wrong Track

With an approval rating of only 19% George Bush is the least popular president since polling began.

Now, his administration have beaten another record, with a whopping 81% saying that the country is moving in the wrong direction, which is the largest amount ever to say this since the New York Times/CBS News started asking the question in the early 1990's.

In the poll, 81 percent of respondents said they believed “things have pretty seriously gotten off on the wrong track,” up from 69 percent a year ago and 35 percent in early 2002.

Although the public mood has been darkening since the early days of the war in Iraq, it has taken a new turn for the worse in the last few months, as the economy has seemed to slip into recession. There is now nearly a national consensus that the country faces significant problems.

A majority of nearly every demographic and political group — Democrats and Republicans, men and women, residents of cities and rural areas, college graduates and those who finished only high school — say the United States is headed in the wrong direction. Seventy-eight percent of respondents said the country was worse off than five years ago; just 4 percent said it was better off.

It's an astonishing record of incompetence, nor is this disapproval limited simply to democrats, it literally is disapproval across the political spectrum.

What makes these figures especially interesting is that they come just before an election in which John McCain essentially offers four more years of the same. That strikes me as a suicidal policy. Why would you promise to emulate the least popular president in the history of your country?

When the presidential campaign began last year, the war in Iraq and terrorism easily topped Americans’ list of concerns. Almost 30 percent of people in a December poll said that one of those issues was the country’s most pressing problem. About half as many named the economy or jobs. But the issues have switched places in just a few months’ time. In the latest poll, 17 percent named terrorism or the war, while 37 percent named the economy or the job market.

This does not bode well for McCain. He was hoping, as all Republicans hope, to play on the voters fears. It now appears that they will be concerned with other things when they enter the polling booths in November.

With 81% saying that the US is moving in the wrong direction, one wonders just how much success McCain can expect by essentially saying, "Full steam ahead!"

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Mugabe: I will quit, as long I do not face prosecution

If he's going, he's certainly not going to go quietly.

The Mugabe regime launched a crackdown targeting opposition leaders and foreign journalists last night ahead of a key meeting of its inner circle this afternoon expected to end a week of speculation over the outcome of elections.

The prospects for a peaceful transition of power to the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) diminished after a day in which security chiefs were reported to have told the ruling Zanu-PF party to refuse to accept a poll defeat.

Late last night, riot police and paramilitaries ransacked opposition offices at one hotel in the centre of Harare and raided another, detaining at least two foreign journalists, including a correspondent for The New York Times. The owner of the hotel was reported to have said that the two two people arrested were Christian Aid workers.

A senior MDC official told The Independent this could be "a sign of things to come" if the opposition and regional leaders did not grant more concessions to Robert Mugabe's party in the negotiations going on behind closed doors following Saturday's poll. As news of the actions spread several senior opposition members denied going into hiding, but said they will "exercise greater caution".

Police officials said the journalists had been detained for working without accreditation.

Zimbabwe uses a restrictive accreditation system and draconian laws to deter critical news organisations from entering the country.

A security source speaking on condition of anonymity said that air force personnel had been called in and told to prepare for violence. There was no confirmation about whether a similar call had been made to the police or army, but the so-called "war veterans" organisation, a paramilitary group often used for intimidating political opponents, was reported to have been called to muster.

Perhaps this is being done to force the opposition to give him what he wants, as the Guardian are carrying a story which states that the old bugger is seeking immunity from prosecution:

Robert Mugabe's aides have told Zimbabwe's opposition leaders that he is prepared to give up power in return for guarantees, including immunity from prosecution for past crimes.

But the aides have warned that if the Movement for Democratic Change does not agree then Mugabe is threatening to declare emergency rule and force another presidential election in 90 days, according to senior opposition sources.

The opposition said the MDC leadership is in direct talks with the highest levels of the army but it is treating the approach with caution because they are distrustful of the individuals involved and calling for direct contact with the president, fearing delaying tactics.

It really is astonishing that a man who has so resoundingly lost an election can now be making these kind of demands almost one week after the election took place.

The only good thing to be said about all this is that the opposition are refusing any offers for power sharing deals, which must have been one of the first places that Mugabe's team went in an attempt to stave off his catastrophic defeat.

Deals are now also being made with the military to ensure a stable transition of power.

The MDC's leadership has also opened direct talks with the "top, top" of the army according to the source.

The source said that the military leadership is looking for "guarantees for their conditions of service" and to keep farms confiscated from whites provided they are productive. The MDC said it has no problems with those issues.

However, almost a week after the election, Mugabe's team are still threatening to take all of this to a second ballot.

"Zanu-PF is ready for a run-off, we are ready for a resulting victory," he said.

"In terms of strategy, we only applied 25% of our energy into this campaign ... (The run-off) is when we are going to unleash the other 75% that we did not apply in the first case."

The MDC fears that what will be unleashed is an extremely violent campaign because that is its last hope Zanu-PF has of curbing support for the opposition.

Hopefully, all of this bluster is simply a bluff in order to force the opposition to give him immunity. I doubt he seriously wants to have another election which he is guaranteed to lose.

But, it is simply astonishing that, having lost the election, Mugabe now feels that he can negotiate the terms under which he will stand down.

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Thursday, April 03, 2008

Joe Lieberman Stabs Obama On Fox News

One of the first things that ever made me aware of Barack Obama was the brilliant way he handled the room when he went down to endorse Joe Lieberman's senate bid.

There's a certain irony to the fact that, after all he did to help Joe, we now get Lieberman stabbing him on Fox News. What would Carville say about such a thing?

He's a class act that Lieberman.

LIEBERMAN: Well, I think that - let me say generally that Sen. Obama doesn't come to this debate with a lot of credibility. Basically on the question of Iraq, John McCain has had the guts to stand out on his own arguing for what he thought was right. And it turned out that he was right about the surge working to improve conditions in Iraq.

If we did what Sen. Obama wanted us to do last year, Al-Qaeda in Iran would be in control of Iraq today. The whole Middle East would be in turmoil and American security and credibility would be jeopardized.

And what does he mean when he refers to "al Qaeda in Iran"? Isn't that the very same mistake that McCain made? And he's got the nerve to talk about Obama's credibility on this subject?

Tags: Lieberman, Obama, McCain, Iraq war

Bill Clinton's tirade stunned some delegates

Bill Clinton has let loose at a meeting of super delegates with a tirade that left most of them reeling and led one of them to declare it, "one of the worst political meetings I have ever attended."

It all kicked off when Rachel Binah told Bill how sorry she was to see James Carville label Richardson a "Judas" for endorsing Obama.

It was as if someone pulled the pin from a grenade.

"Five times to my face (Richardson) said that he would never do that," a red-faced, finger-pointing Clinton erupted.

The former president then went on a tirade that ran from the media's unfair treatment of Hillary to questions about the fairness of the votes in state caucuses that voted for Obama. It ended with him asking delegates to imagine what the reaction would be if Obama was trailing by just 1 percent and people were telling him to drop out.

"It was very, very intense," said one attendee. "Not at all like the Bill of earlier campaigns."

When he finally wound down, Bill was asked what message he wanted the delegates to take away from the meeting.

At that point, a much calmer Clinton outlined his message of party unity.

"It was kind of strange later when he took the stage and told everyone to 'chill out,' " one delegate told us.

"We couldn't help but think he was also talking to himself."

Indeed, even Bill appears to have realised that his outburst was over the top as, when Binah returned home, there was a message waiting for her relaying Clinton's apology for what had taken place.

However, as news of Bill's outburst became public a spokesperson for Richardson said that Richardson had never promised the Clinton camp that he would endorse them.

And Bill does, on some level, appear to be defending Carville's claim that Richardson is "a Judas".

This is a further example of what I find most distasteful about the Clinton election machine. The notion that it is fair game to trample anyone and anything which stands in your way.

There are rumours that this is why many super delegates who favour Obama are reticent about coming out and announcing their intention to endorse him, and it's because they fear that the Clinton camp will take vengeance on them.

What those remaining undeclared folks are telling me in private, though, is that they hope the race will play itself out and Obama will emerge as the clear winner so that they don't have to piss the Clintons and their machine off. They don't want the Clintons and McAuliffe and those donors who signed the letter to stop raising money for them. They don't want Carville and Wolfson to call them a traitor. They don't want all the behind-the-scenes trashing that they know will come.

Fear of vengeance might be a good way to keep cowardly super delegates in their box, but it's a morally repugnant way to achieve a democratic victory. Bill, by defending what Carville said, is endorsing those kind of tactics. This is what makes so many of us, who would have enthusiastically supported a Clinton presidency, now back away in disgust.

Obama really is offering a new kind of politics, and hearing of Bill's latest rant, it feels like it's long overdue.

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Maddow destroys Scarborough's claim that McCain is "a maverick".

The media always seem unwilling to accept that the box they have placed politicians in no longer fits. And nowhere is this more obvious than in it's claim that John McCain is a "maverick". McCain has been flip flopping like crazy to please the Republican base and Maddow easily takes Scarborough's argument apart. Scarborough would apparently prefer that facts be kept out of this argument.

Mugabe's party loses control of parliament

For the first times since gaining independence twenty eight years ago, Zimbabwe's parliament is no longer controlled by Zanu-PF.

The results of the presidential race have been held back by the government of Mugabe which has led Morgan Tsvangirai to jump the gun, despite Mugabe's warning of coups and how they would be dealt with, and Tsvangirai has declared that he had a majority over Mugabe, essentially claiming that he is now the president of Zimbabwe.

However, the MDC's calculation that Tsvangirai won just above the 50% of the ballot required to avoid a run-off election means another round of voting is likely if Mugabe wants it.

The trickle of official results from Saturday's election delivered the two wings of the MDC an outright majority in the lower house of parliament with 114 of the 210 seats. Zanu-PF took 94. Seven of Mugabe's cabinet ministers lost their seats.

In the presidential race, the MDC figures gave Tsvangirai 50.3% of the vote to 43.8% for Mugabe. A third candidate, Simba Makoni, a former finance minister, took nearly 6%.

The state-run Herald newspaper added to speculation that Mugabe would hold out for a second round by saying the presidential results that have yet to be released by the election commission pointed to a run-off. The MDC secretary general, Tendai Biti, said the official results should be released immediately, and should reflect Tsvangirai's outright victory, but that the MDC is ready for a second round of elections "under protest".

"One of the key pillars of the state, the legislature, is now controlled by the opposition," he said. "What these results show is everyone in Zimbabwe is ready for change. It appears the state media is preparing the public for a run-off ... A run-off really serves no purpose other than to embarrass certain elderly quarters."

The danger of Tsvangirai's statement is that Mugabe may take this as a chance to say that he is acting to see off a coup and there are already worrying noises coming from some quarters.

Mugabe's spokesman, George Charamba, who previously warned that the MDC announcing it had won would amount to "a coup", again threatened the party.

"You are drifting in very dangerous territory and I hope the MDC is prepared for the consequences," he said.

Zanu-PF's deputy information minister, Bright Matonga, called the MDC's declaration "mischievous" and accused it of trying to provoke a reaction from the security forces.

These are tense times in Zimbabwe and, with parliament now gone, one would hope that Mugabe will see that the writing really is on the wall and that it is time to step down. However, he does have the option of going for a second ballot. Whether or not he decides to go for that is what we are waiting for.

But the warnings from the army are certainly ominous.

Matonga said: "The army is behind President Mugabe. The police force is behind him. President Mugabe is going nowhere."

The danger for Matonga is that many of his foot soldiers may have cast their votes against Mugabe, and he is taking a risk if he asks them to put down popular protests or act to overturn the election results.

Mugabe is desperately unpopular, and it's becoming impossible to hide that now. He may have the army behind him and he may have the police force behind him, but he does not have the people behind him.

That is why Zimbabwe literally stands on the edge of the abyss. Maybe now, at long last and after years of procrastination, Mbeki of South Africa can be persuaded to finally step in and tell Mugabe that, this time, it really is all over.

Based on his behaviour in the past though, I won't be holding my breath.

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Wednesday, April 02, 2008

Did Mukasey simply make that up?

So is Mukasey a liar or was the Bush administration completely incompetent?

McCain: Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have been killed.

McCain admits that "hundreds of thousands" of Iraqis have died as a result of the invasion.

Clinton’s lead in the Pennsylvania Primary is shrinking

We can but dream.

Senator Hillary Clinton’s lead in the Pennsylvania Primary is shrinking.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in Pennsylvania shows Clinton leading Barack Obama by just five percentage points, 47% to 42%. For Clinton, that five-point edge is down from a ten-point lead a week ago, a thirteen-point lead in mid-March and a fifteen-point advantage in early March.

Wouldn't it be simply marvellous if Obama could deal her a killer blow in Pennsylvania and bring the whole thing to a close?

Of course I'm being terribly presumptive here. Even if she lost Pennsylvania there is still every indication that she would want to keep going until Florida and Michigan have been resolved. And she'd probably invent some new reason why Pennsylvania doesn't count and why the super delegates should vote for her.

In a campaign where the election should be decided on who is best to beat McCain rather than who the voters voted for, votes actually count for very little. Most pundits have missed this subtle point. Indeed, the very election is a waste of time as Hillary is without question the person that America is pining for, even if America is in deep denial of it's need.

John Cole today links to a new Clinton autobiography which might help awaken the US to it's need for Clinton.

After a few moments the Irishman straightened and began surveying the aftermath of the battle, a slightly ill expression stealing over his face. For all his considerable talents, the singer had never had the stomach for wetwork.
“Does it ever bother you?” he said softly. Catching my tight expression, he hurriedly corrected himself.

“Not this – ” he said, waving a hand to indicate the bloody scene. “I just mean – you’ve saved the Northern Ireland peace process, again, and no one will ever know.”

I gave him a steady stare. “Someday people will know. When the time is right. Until then, I’m content to operate in the shadows.”

The singer looked at me curiously, studying my face. “You seem – different, somehow. That thing in Tuzla, now this . . . it’s done something to you. Almost like you’ve – ”

“Crossed a threshold,” I murmured, the phrase springing to mind unbidden. The words felt powerful somehow, totemic, pregnant with future possibilities.

It's such a shame that Obama might, just might, turn things his way in Pennsylvania, because the entire election is a waste of time. The US needs Hillary, whether it knows it or not.

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Zimbabwe on a precipice as pressure grows on Mugabe

It's very hard to work out what's actually taking place in Zimbabwe as each paper appears to have a different take on the events which may or may not be taking place behind the scenes.

In the Guardian we are told that Tsvangirai is refusing to make any backroom deals with Mugabe until all of the election results are released, whist the Independent states that an exit package is being negotiated which may even involve Mugabe leaving the country.

After 28 years of seemingly unshakeable authority – in which all opponents have been sidelined, exiled or killed – the "old man" as Zimbabweans call him, was reported to be considering relinquishing power. Saturday's elections went so strongly against the ruling party, that it is understood he has been advised to quit now rather than face a humiliating second round against his hated rival, Mr Tsvangirai.

Sources close to the talks said that an "exit package" was being negotiated that could see the 84-year-old retire or even, according to one scenario, leave the country. While an agreement was far from settled, Mr Mugabe was believed to be seeking immunity from prosecution as well as guarantees relating to millions of pounds worth of assets held in a number of countries.

The Guardian version is slightly darker, with denials of deals and hints of possible violence to come:

Tsvangirai said last night the MDC would release its final results today confirming his victory and he called on the government's electoral commission to respect the will of the people by immediately releasing the official presidential results.

"There is no way the MDC will enter into any deal before [the electoral commission] has announced the official results," he said at a press conference in Harare. "Our country is on the precipice, on the cliff edge, as we wait."

However, as the election results continue to come out a funereal pace, even to the extent of ludicrously giving Mugabe a slight lead, one can't help feeling that the game really is up for Mugabe. If he were going to try and brazen this one out, one gets the feeling that he would have had to have gone about this differently. He would have had to be brazen, but his hesitancy at publishing the results has spoken volumes, whether he meant it to or not.

On Monday, Tsvangirai approached the former army chief Solomon Mujuru, who is still a powerful figure within the military, to say the MDC was prepared to discuss the security establishment's concerns and reassure it that a transfer of power would not lead to prosecutions for past crimes or a purge.

That contact has now broadened. The MDC is also reaching out to elements of Zanu-PF through a third presidential candidate, Simba Makoni, a former finance minister who broke with the president but still has party support.

One gets the feeling that support for Mugabe is fading, even amongst the Zanu-PF.

The different versions in different newspapers are indicative of how little we actually know about what is going to take place next. So they are all guessing, as am I.

But it just feels like the writing is on the wall for Mugabe. I think his first instinct would have been to simply brass this out and claim victory, but one hears stories that the rest of Zanu-PF were stunned by the sheer size of their defeat and privately acknowledge that one cannot go completely against the will of the people.

The same applies to the army chiefs who stated that they would not accept an opposition victory. How can they be sure that their foot soldiers will back them should they order them to round up opposition leaders when some 60% of Zimbabweans supported Tsvangirai with only 30% supporting Mugabe? Even coups need some kind of credibility. It appears that Mugabe now has none.

Maybe he'll go for a run off election but that strikes me as foolhardy. I wouldn't be surprised if a jet suddenly removes Mugabe from the country taking him into exile in South Africa. Who knows? We're all guessing and we're all watching and waiting to see what Mugabe does next.

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Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Gravel Drops Out After Talks with Obama.

If only Hillary could be this pragmatic.

Mike Gravel has announced his intention to drop out of the presidential race after holding a meeting with Democratic frontrunner Barack Obama.

Gravel, who switched parties to run as a Libertarian on March 26th, stated that his decision was the result of a pledge from Obama to adopt the National Initiative for Democracy. The National Initiative, which would allow citizens to propose, alter, or nullify laws in conjunction with traditional legislative bodies, has been the cornerstone of Gravel's presidential run.

This is obviously a way for Obama to illustrate the new kind of politics which he has been promising and an Obama aid has pointed out how successful this has been in other countries where it has been tried.

The aide also stressed the importance of the National Initiative in setting the Obama campaign apart from that of Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. "Countries like Switzerland have shown that federal ballot initiatives can produce sound lawmaking," she said. "It's time that a major candidate for president got behind a serious proposal to entrust the people with the same power we place in the hands of our elected leaders. By adopting the National Initiative, Senator Obama is sending a clear signal that he trusts the American people to have a more direct role in their government."

Gravel, obviously considerate of the fact some of his supporters might feel aggrieved, has urged them to see the National Initiative as a prize worth working with Obama to achieve.

Before announcing his intent to bow out of the race for the presidency, Senator Gravel discussed his meeting with Barack Obama. "Stop and think," Gravel told reporters. "This is a real chance to empower the American people by giving them the ability to make laws. 24 states already have ballot initiatives that give the people the same power as their representatives without dramatically changing the way our government works.

The National Initiative is obviously important for Gravel as he is still insisting that he will not accept any offer to be in Obama’s cabinet, which doesn’t really surprise me, as he has already referred to Obama as being beholden to "corporatocracy" and "the military-industrial complex".

At least Gravel’s sticking to his principles. He’s not like that other person who offers the VP to someone who she has already described as being unfit for the job.

Hat tip for this video to The Largest Minority.

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Hillary leaves no rock unturned.

I've constantly said that there is nothing that the Clinton camp won't attempt to bring Obama down, but this is ridiculous even by their standards.

The Clinton campaign is distributing an article in the American Spectator (!) about Obama foreign policy adviser Merrill McPeak and his penchant for.. well, the article accuses him of being an anti-Semite and a drunk.

Principally, the author takes McPeak to task for supporting a Middle East map that would require Israel to withdraw to its pre-1967 border.

It also makes the case that McPeak supports the Walt-Mearsheimer view of the influence of the Israeli lobby on foreign policy.

The author's sudden conclusion: "Obama has a Jewish problem and McPeak's bigoted views are emblematic of what they are. Obama can issue all the boilerplate statements supporting Israel's right to defend itself he wants. But until he accepts responsibility for allowing people like McPeak so close to his quest for the presidency, Obama's sincerity and judgment will remain open questions."

If wanting Israel to return to the 1967 borders in indicative of anti-Semitism then the entire United Nations and just about every US administration since 1967 would have to be put into that camp.

Is Hillary seriously arguing that Israel should not return to the 1967 borders? For if she is, then she is campaigning against international law and resolution 242 which calls for just that.

This is yet another example of the damage that Hillary continuing to run - whilst having virtually no chance of winning - will do to the Democratic chances come November. Hints that Obama might be anti-Semitic are simply odious and should play no part in this contest.

Once again, Hillary proves that she will go anywhere and say anything if she thinks it will help her campaign.

She, and her supporters, are coming across as deranged. Today, I note, some of them are singing the praises of Fox News for their "balanced" coverage of the Clinton/Obama race. Fox wouldn't be doing this because Limbaugh has called on Republicans to support Hillary in order to damage Obama as much as possible before November, would they? I mean the fact that this doesn't even occur to these people is simply laughable.

They threatened to throw the kitchen sink at Obama but Hillary has now started throwing anything she can get her hands on. And the fact that Fox News applaud such behaviour hasn't even occurred to her supporters as something which they should find worrying.

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Obama: Who is best suited to take on McCain?

Apologies for another video, but I do think these speeches serve to remind us all what is actually at stake in this election. A break with the past or a continuation of the mind set which brought us the Iraq war.

Obama: "Anything goes" is actually a turn off.

This is why Obama is doing so well. He begins by being very gracious about Hillary and telling people to vote for her if they think that she will be the best candidate. He then points out that one of the reasons that he is doing so well is because he doesn't play the "anything goes in order to be elected" game which Hillary appears to excel at playing.

Every time Hillary attacks him she only ever appears to damage herself. And the impression that she will do or say anything in order to beat him - what Taylor Marsh chooses to see as "Hillary the fighter" - is actually an electoral turn off.

Obama's greatest strength is that he doesn't indulge in negative politics. Clinton's supporters appear not to even understand what he is doing.

Secret Mugabe meeting ponders military move or fixed result - but not an admission of defeat

The results of the Zimbabwean elections are leaking out with what can only be described as a theatrical slowness. And there is every indication that the results are coming out so slowly because Mugabe has the sheer nerve to be preparing to name himself as Zimbabwe's next president.

A crisis meeting of Robert Mugabe's security cabinet decided to block the opposition from taking power after what appears to have been a comprehensive victory in Zimbabwe's elections but was divided between using a military takeover to annul the vote and falsifying the results.

Diplomatic and Zimbabwean sources who heard first-hand accounts of the Joint Operations Command meeting of senior military and intelligence officers and top party officials on Sunday night said Mugabe favoured immediately declaring himself president again but was persuaded to use the country's electoral commission to keep the opposition from power.

The commission began releasing a trickle of results yesterday, more than 36 hours after the polls closed, but the opposition Movement for Democratic Change said it believed the count was being manipulated.

This blatant fixing of the result is hardly a surprise, however one would hope that international pressure would be brought to bear on Mugabe and that South Africa especially would use it's influence to tell Mugabe that the game is up.

Independent monitors collating the count from polling booth returns say the MDC presidential candidate, Morgan Tsvangirai, won about 55% of the vote and Mugabe 38%. The MDC also gained control of both houses of parliament, according to the monitors.

The MDC said the slow pace of releasing vote tallies - likely to take days at the present rate - was further reason to suspect they were being tampered with.

The speed with which the results are being delivered, alone, tells us that Mugabe has been thrown off course and is frantically trying to fix things in his own favour. It's interesting that reports are coming out that he has been persuaded from simply pulling off a military takeover, as I would have imagined this to have been the first place his mind went. It appears that others have persuaded him that the international community would object to this, so he has decided to slowly release the manufactured figures which gives him an unlikely victory.

Sources with knowledge of the JOC meeting said the Zanu-PF leadership was "in shock" after it was informed of the scale of the victory of the MDC's presidential candidate, Morgan Tsvangirai.

A senior diplomatic source who received accounts from two people privy to the JOC meeting said it discussed shutting down the count and Mugabe declaring himself re-elected or the army stepping in to declare martial law on the pretext of defending the country from instability caused by the opposition claiming victory.

"In the JOC meeting there were two options for Mugabe: to declare victory on Sunday or declare martial law," said the diplomat. "They did not consider conceding. We understand Mugabe nearly decided to declare victory. Cooler heads prevailed. It was decided to use the [election commission] process of drip, drip where you release results over a long period, giving the opposition gains at first but as time wears on Zanu-PF pulls ahead."

Another source said that some JOC members favoured a less hardline approach by reaching out to the opposition but were overruled.

The longer this drags on, the more it becomes clear what we are witnessing. Mugabe is not about to accept defeat and is going to declare himself victorious after allowing Tsvangirai some victories.

However, this will not be as easy as Mugabe appears to believe.

If the government does attempt to fix the result it will not go unchallenged. The election commission will have to substantially alter a large number of polling booth returns in order to overturn Tsvangirai's significant lead. But the MDC has photographed results declarations pinned to the doors of more than 8,000 polling stations. If the numbers announced by the election commission are different, the party says it will have indisputable evidence of fraud.

"Unlike previous elections no one can privatise the result as it is posted outside the stations," said the MDC's secretary general, Tendai Biti. "This country stands on a precipice. We still express our great misgivings about [the election commission's] failure to announce the results. It raises tension among the people that is fertilising an atmosphere of suspicion."

Britain is, of course, seen as the centre of all evil by the Zimbabwean regime, but Miliband is stating that Brown will be putting pressure on Thabo Mbeki, the South African leader, to recognise that Mugabe has been defeated.

I wish them luck with that, as I personally hold Mbeki responsible for allowing Mugabe to get away with murder. I have no great faith that Mbeki will now suddenly develop the strength to do what is right.

The initial celebrations which took place across Zimbabwe have stopped as people realise what is taking place. The question now isn't whether or not Mugabe will try to steal the election, the question is whether or not the world will allow him to do so.

So we watch and wait...

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