The Osterley Times

Friday, June 05, 2009

US TV examines Obama's Cairo speech.

Even Pat Buchanan finds positives in Obama's speech. I am really pleased that Buchanan recognises the courage that it took for Obama to go to Cairo and speak as forcefully and as honestly as he did.

Buchanan states, "I think he's going to break Bibi!"

O'Reilly described Obama's speech as "noble". However, it is too much for O'Reilly that Obama mentioned the word "torture" and insisted that he will close Guantanamo Bay.

It is simply astounding to me that, after hearing that speech, this is what Billo heard.

He then invited Karl Rove - of all bloody people - to give us his take on things. Rove thinks the speech got "pretty bad" as Obama mentioned "colonialism" and the US never colonised the Middle East. The truth is that Obama never claimed it was the US who colonised the Middle East, he simply acknowledged that British colonialism took place.

When O'Reilly points out how unpopular Bush's policies were in the Middle East, Rove finishes by saying, "Who cares about whether or not they approve or like the president of the United States, the question is do they respect the policies of the United States government?"

In other words, it doesn't matter if they like us, all that matters is whether or not they fear us.

It's no wonder that Rove is appalled when he sees someone applying a vision to this dispute that goes against everything that he believes in.

UPDATE:

Another thought. Is Rove actually insane enough to think, as he implies here, that the policies of Bush and Cheney, which included the Iraq war and the starving of the Palestinians, were actually "respected" in the Middle East? That's simply bonkers.

UPDATE II:

Krauthammer utterly hated it, which makes me think that Obama must be on the right track. The truth is that Krauthammer is furious and I don't think it's really about women's issues or moral equivalence. Krauthammer is Likud to his bones and his fury is probably a sign that he recognises that Obama is not going to back off here.

UPDATE III:

She's everywhere.

“I think that if we lived in a world where terrorism, and the slaughter of innocents, and Iran’s hegemonic hopes for the Middle East could be met, could be defeated, could be dealt with by sort of hand-holding going forward, then we’d be in a much simpler environment. But these are very, very tough issues. And I was troubled by the extent to which I heard moral relativism.”

And, of course, she will see Obama offering "hand holding". Her daddy's policy was much better. Simply refuse to speak to them. The US should "stand up to Iran", she wails.

I'm sorry, but wasn't there an election in the US in which all of these points were raised, and in which Obama argued against the very philosophy which Cheney is espousing, which the Republicans lost?

Sometimes listening to people like Liz Cheney it's hard to believe that this even happened.

Obama's "interference" in Israeli politics.

And so the fightback begins. As Obama reaches out to the Muslim world, and has the temerity to question Israel's right to build settlements which are regarded as illegal under international law, so Israel's supporters take to the airwaves and to print to tell us that it is completely unreasonable for Obama to talk to Israel with the same frankness as he addresses the Palestinians.

Today's Jerusalem Post tells us that Obama, "has crossed the line into interfering in Israeli politics."

And AIPAC let it be known that Obama's public demands on Israel are simply unacceptable:

The pro-Israel lobby AIPAC last week got the signatures of 329 members of Congress, including key figures in both parties, on a letter calling on the administration to work “closely and privately” with Israel — in contrast to the current public pressure.

In other words AIPAC would prefer the arrangement which Israel enjoyed when George Bush was president when Israel and the US would say one thing publicly but have a private "understanding" that the rules which they had publicly expressed did not actually apply to Israel. That, although Israel had publicly promised to end settlement building, both the US and Israel "understood" that she would not. Wink, wink.

This is the kind of thing which has always undermined Arab confidence in the US as an honest broker, the feeling that the US is firmly in the Israeli camp and that the US and Israel have secret deals and "understandings" which they know about and the rest of us don't.

This is the very thing which Obama has promised to end and it was why he received such a huge round of applause in Cairo when he stated:

"We will say in public what we say in private. To Israelis and Palestinians and Arabs."

So, AIPAC can reprimand Obama as much as they want but the secret deals and "understandings" which they enjoyed during the Bush years were part of the problem, not the solution.

Which is precisely why AIPAC are calling "foul". For years the Israelis have pretended to seek peace whilst all the while acquiring more and more Palestinian land. Obama is publicly and loudly telling them to stop. This is what they can't bear and this is why they are now, farcically, claiming that Obama has strayed into "interfering in Israeli politics".

Glenn Greenwald has a good take on this:

Similarly, businesses are free to make whatever decisions they want about how they are to be run -- as long as they remain independent. But if they go to a bank – or the federal government -- and plead for a loan, then the lender is perfectly justified in imposing all sorts of conditions ("we’ll lend to you only if you spend more responsibly, refrain from paying your executives more than X, not use the funds for Y," etc.). If banks and other companies want to be free of what conservatives and libertarians complain is undue influence from the federal government, then they shouldn’t seek loans and bailouts from the federal government.
Identically, if Israel wants to be free of what it and some of its U.S. supporters call "interference" from the Obama administration, that’s very easy to achieve: Israel can stop asking for tens of billions of dollars of American taxpayer money, huge amounts of military and weapons supplies for its various wars, and unyielding American diplomatic protection at the U.N. But as long as Israel remains dependent on the U.S. in countless ways, then Obama not only has the right -- but he has the obligation -- to demand that Israel cease activities which harm U.S. interests.

Obama made it clear yesterday that it is, "in Israel's interests, Palestine's interests, America's interests, and the world's interest" that a two state solution be found where both Israel and Palestine can live side by side in peace.

The thing which is causing fury and befuddlement amongst Israel's supporters is the feeling that this guy sounds as if he is actually serious about this.

Ha'aretz describes the reaction in Israel:

Nonetheless, no one can ignore the speech given by Barack Obama: The mountain birthed a mountain. Obama remained Obama. Only the Israeli analysts tried to diminish the speech's importance ("not terrible"), to spread fear ("he mentioned the Holocaust and the Nakba in a single breath"), or were insulted on our behalf ("he did not mention our right to the land as promised in the Bible"). All these were redundant and unnecessary. Obama emerged Thursday as a true friend of Israel.

The prime minister ordered the ministers to say nothing, but of course they could not help but invade the studios. Uzi Landau said that a Palestinian state is tantamount to an "Iranian state." Isaac Herzog appeared even more ridiculous when he said that the problem with the settlements is one of "public relations." In essence, both were busy with the same problem: How can we manage to pull the new America's leg as well? Israeli politicians have never before appeared as pathetic, as small as they did Thursday, compared to the bearer of promise in Cairo.

One must always bear in mind, when we hear of complaints coming from AIPAC and the Likud party, that they represent only the Israeli right wing position. It is clear that Ha'aretz and the Kadima party and all the others on the Israeli left are applauding Obama for having the courage to say what he has said.

This is the thinking of a great leader, who walked with wisdom and sensitivity between the Holocaust and the Nakba, between Israelis and Palestinians, between Americans and Arabs, between Christians, Jews and Muslims.

Our right-wingers were disappointed that he did not approve at least of Gush Etzion, and the peace lovers were disappointed that he did not offer a timetable. But a speech is just that, and the time for carrying things out is still to come.

And the latest right wing taking point, that Obama has no right to interfere in another democracy's business is simply too hypocritical to be taken remotely seriously.

No-one surely forgets that when Hamas were democratically elected that the Israelis immediately started starving the Palestinian population for having the temerity to elect a party which they opposed?

No, Obama is doing okay, which is why the Israeli right have started screaming so loudly. They have a dreadful feeling that he might not be as easy to con as some of his predecessors.

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PM told to go as minister quits.

The Blairites are making their move to oust Gordon Brown from the leadership of the Labour party and their moves are no longer hidden, nor are they employing code to send their message.

Even before the European election votes have been counted, they have resorted to all out frontal assault.

James Purnell has stepped down from the cabinet and told Prime Minister Gordon Brown to "stand aside".

In a letter to several newspapers, the work and pensions secretary said Mr Brown's continued leadership made a Tory victory "more, not less likely". He is the third cabinet member in three days to say they are standing down.

The notion that Labour's position in the polls can be fixed by replacing Brown is simply fanciful. True, Gordon lacks a populist touch and his handling of the expenses scandal and the Gurkha situation left a lot to be desired.

But, if he steps down, it is ridiculous to imagine that the public are simply going to accept a new Labour leader without an election. And it is insanity to imagine that a Labour party which is imploding in front of our eyes is ever going to win the next election.

Hazel Blears and James Purnell are handing the Tories the next election on a silver platter.

Brown has a year before he has to go to the polls and he is hoping that in that year he can turn this around. After all, he has been right regarding the economy and Cameron has been wrong. Cameron is still the man who believes that we should do nothing and allow the recession to do it's worst. He would watch tens of thousands lose their jobs and tell us that this was the market correcting itself.

Cameron might be better than Brown at positioning himself and playing the spin game, but I would rather be led hesitantly down the right road by Brown than confidently down the wrong road by Cameron. And that is the choice that we currently face.

UPDATE:

The BBC are announcing that John Hutton is standing down "for personal reasons". This is beginning to resemble the Titanic.

UPDATE II:

At least Hutton is making clear that he still supports Brown.

Click title for full article.

Thursday, June 04, 2009

Obama pledges new beginning between US and Muslims.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

I think it's fair to say that his speech went down a storm.

"I have come here to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world: one based upon mutual interest and mutual respect; and one based on the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive," he said.

He greeted his audience in Arabic and was rewarded with thunderous applause. Indeed, he only had to quote from the Qur'an to ensure applause.

When discussing 9-11 he did not fail to defend the rightness of the US decision to invade Afghanistan in search of bin Laden and, to back up his claim he, again, quoted the Qur'an:

"The Holy Qur'an teaches that whoever kills an innocent, it is as if he has killed all mankind; and whoever saves a person, it is as if he has saved all mankind … Islam is not part of the problem in combating violent extremism – it is an important part of promoting peace," he said.

Again, he was greeted with tumultuous applause.

He admitted that Iraq was "a war of choice" and his promise to, in future, use diplomacy and seek international consensus whenever possible, also went down well.

But, exactly as he did when he visited Europe, he promised to fight any Muslim stereotypes he came across in the US, but demanded the same from the Muslim world.

It was this same fairness which he brought when discussing the Israel/Palestine issue, although the fact that he is being so fair - which is utterly unusual for an American president - was what made this appear so incredible.

He spoke of the US's "unbreakable" bond with Israel. And reminded his audience that Holocaust deniers and people who threaten Israel's destruction are "ignorant and hateful".

And then, the flip side:

In one of the most eagerly awaited elements of the speech, he issued a tough message to Israel that went down well with his audience: stop building settlements on land claimed by Palestinians.

Marking a change from the Bush administration, Obama said: "Israelis must acknowledge that just as Israel's right to exist cannot be denied, neither can Palestine's. The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop."

He promised that the US would not turn their backs on the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people for a state.

"If we see this conflict only from one side or the other, then we will be blind to the truth. The only resolution is for the aspirations of both sides to be met through two states where Israelis and Palestinians each live in peace and security. That is in Israel's interests, Palestine's interests, America's interests, and the world's interest. And that is why I intend to personally pursue this outcome with all the patience and dedication that the task requires."

He then derided the Palestinians for the cowardice of firing rockets into buildings where children sleep.

It was, all in all, a blistering performance.

It goes without saying that it is impossible to imagine his predecessor going into the Muslim world and making such a speech. And, in a side swipe at the Israeli claim that Bush and Sharon had some sneaky deal where Israel was not bound to abide by the treaties which she had publicly signed, Obama promised transparency:

"We will say in public what we say in private. To Israelis and Palestinians and Arabs."

He even opened his hands to Iran and vowed that he wanted a world where there were no nuclear weapons.

He then finished by promoting democracy whilst distancing himself from the notion of one nation imposing democracy upon others. He even managed, whilst speaking in Cairo, to get a round of applause while calling freedom "a human right". Indeed, he was even interrupted by a call of, "We love you!" whilst making these demands.

Right wingers will pick holes, but I simply can't think of any way which he could have made a better speech at this time or in this place.

Click title for source.

Sotomayor a racist? Newt Gingrich takes it back.

It appears as if even Newt Gingrich is walking back from his insistence that Sotomayor is a racist.

Newt Gingrich, a former House speaker who has called Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor a racist, backed away from those comments Wednesday but continued to question whether her philosophy qualified her to become the first Latino on the high court.

Gingrich had joined with conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh in calling Sotomayor a racist after comments she made in 2001 comparing the judgment of Latinas and white men were widely circulated.

In a letter to supporters and in a posting on his website Wednesday, Gingrich said the use of the word “racist should not have been applied to Judge Sotomayor as a person, even if her words themselves are unacceptable."

"My initial reaction was strong and direct -- perhaps too strong and too direct," Gingrich said. "The sentiment struck me as racist, and I said so. Since then, some who want to have an open and honest consideration of Judge Sotomayor's fitness to serve on the nation's highest court have been critical of my word choice."

In other words fellow Republicans, perhaps some who still entertain the notion that it might be nice to be re-elected someday, realise that Gingrich and Limbaugh have been engaged in an utterly suicidal course of action which made the Republican party appear sexist and willing to read into Sotomayor's statement only the worst possible intent, ignoring the overall argument she was making.

So, Gingrich has, at last, stepped back from the precipice.

However, some things never change:

But Gingrich's change of heart did not sway Limbaugh. "I'm not retracting it," Limbaugh said Wednesday on his program.

"Now they may say 'Don't say it, Rush. Dial it back a little bit.' But nobody's saying I'm wrong," he said. "I mean, when she says that she'd do a better job than a white guy, what is it? It's racism. It's reverse racism, whatever, but it's still racism. She would bring a form of racism, bigotry to the court."

El Fatto never tires of being on the wrong side of every single issue. It's actually becoming rather endearing. Much in the way a slightly doddery uncle might make you smile at his flatulence.

And yes, lots of us have been saying that Rush is wrong.

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Limbaugh: I do and still want Obama to fail.

He just can't help himself. Hannity even tries to set it up as if the last time Limbaugh was misquoted, but Rush is having none of it. He WANTS Obama to fail.

Suddenly, all of the shit about it being your duty to support a US president at a time of war is exposed as the partisan crap it always was. It is only your duty to support a Republican president at a time of war. When a Democrat is in power it is perfectly acceptable to wish for failure.

The man's a moron. As is his interviewer.

Cheney Acknowledges Passing The Buck On GM: Bush Didn’t ‘Want To Be The One Who Pulled The Plug’

Am I reading this wrong? It appears to me as if Cheney is saying that he would rather GM had gone bankrupt rather than have the government own part of the company and that Bush put together a package to hold GM together just long enough for Obama to come to power and be forced to do the dirty deed which Bush didn't want on his own hands.

CHENEY: Well, I thought that, eventually, the right outcome was going to be bankruptcy. … And the president decided that he did not want to be the one who pulled the plug just before he left office.

VAN SUSTEREN: Why?

CHENEY: Well, I think he felt, you know, these are big issues and he wouldn’t be there through the process of managing it, but in effect, would have sort of pulled the plug on GM and that was one of the first crises the new administration would have to deal with. So he put together a package that tided GM over until the new administration had a chance to look at it, decide what they wanted to do.

VAN SUSTEREN: But it’s cost us billions to get — I mean, you know —

CHENEY: It has. … And now the government owns a big chunk of General Motors. That bothers me. I don’t like having government own those kinds of major financial enterprises. I think it’s — it does damage to our long-term economic prospects when we get government involved in making those kinds of decisions.

So, bankruptcy was "the right outcome" but the Bush regime wanted to hand Obama the political shit stick and hoped that they could force him to be the one to close the doors on so many American jobs.

Class, Dick, real class.

Hat tip to Thinkprogress.

Organisation of American States decides to readmit Cuba.

It would appear as if, despite all evidence to the contrary, the world is sometimes capable of good sense:

The Organisation of American States tonight lifted Cuba's half-century-old suspension in a dramatic decision to bring Havana back into Latin America's diplomatic fold.

The pan-regional body rebuffed the United States, which lobbied against the move, and revoked a 1962 cold war measure which had marked the communist island as a pariah.

"The cold war has ended this day in San Pedro Sula," said Manuel Zelaya, the president of Honduras, who hosted the 34-member organisation in Honduras's second city.

Dozens of foreign ministers from the Caribbean as well as central and South America stood to applaud when the announcement was made at the end of the two-day summit. "This is a moment of rejoicing for all of Latin America," Ecuador's foreign minister, Fander Falconi, told reporters.

Cuba said it had no interest in rejoining the OAS, which Fidel Castro this week called a "Trojan horse" for US interests, but the opening of the door was a diplomatic victory for Havana and exposed Washington's isolation.

After almost fifty years, the Cold war reaction to Cuba is beginning to thaw.

Most of Latin America, after eight years of Bush and the neo-cons, is now more leftist than at any other time in history, so we shouldn't really be surprised at this taking place at this moment in time.

But it's extremely welcome nevertheless.

"The vote to readmit Cuba to the OAS represents an unprecedented assertion of Latin American power in a hemispheric institution long dominated by the US," said Daniel Erikson, an analyst at the Inter-American Dialogue thinktank and author of The Cuba Wars.

Washington recently softened its economic embargo against Cuba - a controversial policy enshrined the same year the OAS suspended the fledgling Castro government - but that was not enough to appease Latin leaders demanding bolder steps.

"The vote sends a powerful signal to the Obama administration that the path of moderate, incremental change in US policy towards Cuba is depleting America's political capital in the region at an alarming rate," said Erikson.

Latin leaders gave Obama a rapturous reception at an April summit in Trinidad and Tobago, his regional debut, but today's decision showed a steely resolve to stand up to the "gringo" superpower which is considered to have bullied the region for over a century.

There is great goodwill towards Obama from Latin America, but only because they hope that he will be the agent of change which he promised to be.

This vote shows the kind of change that they hope to witness. Obama has often reminded us that it is a form of madness to keep doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome. Nowhere has that flawed policy been more evident than in the US's reaction to Cuba.

The policy hasn't worked for fifty years. Even longer than the US's failed policy towards Iran.

Latin America is now telling Obama that it is time for change.

Click title for full article.

Gordon Brown hangs on, for now.

As I said yesterday, it was as bad as I have seen things in my lifetime, Hazel Blears had stood down two hours before Brown was due to answer Prime Ministers questions, in what was clearly an attempt to undermine his premiership and, for the first time that I am aware of, LBC actually cut away from it's normal programming to listen live as Cameron and Brown faced each other in the Commons.

This was the moment when Cameron was going to put the Brown premiership to bed... except he didn't.

He landed no killer blow and allowed Brown to portray him as an opportunist with no real substance and certainly with nothing that one could refer to as policies.

More opportunities will no doubt come, especially in the wake of today's European elections, but one can't help but think that Cameron might lack a killer instinct. After all, Blears had delivered this one to him on a plate, she had almost begged that he put the Labour party out of it's misery, but Cameron waffled and managed to make his attempt to kill off Brown look feeble and, simultaneously, impolite.

Brown was able to portray the recent expenses scandal as something which was effecting all political parties, which it is, and Cameron's attempts to displace him as a distraction from the adult business of attempting to correct the anomalies which allowed this scandal to take place at all and a sideshow which was un-serious at a time of great economic upheaval.

Brown actually blew him out of the water simply by the fact that he survived at all. Cameron had all the cards, Blears had aided him hugely by the timing of her departure, and yet Cameron allowed Brown to turn the tables on him and deliver a victory for Brown rather than his Tory counterpart.

One of Brown's closest aides vowed "the prime minister will only be taken out of Downing Street in a box", adding: "If he is ousted, no successor would be able to withstand the demands for an immediate general election, and that will destroy us for a generation."

There is a great truth in that. If Brown does not survive then Labour are finished as no incoming Labour leader will be able to avoid going to the polls for an election which they are guaranteed to lose.

So, he staggers on, facing European elections at which his party is guaranteed to be mauled for reasons that I have never quite understood. After all, his party is no more culpable of expenses fraud than the opposition, despite the hysteria which is currently gripping the country.

Every time I switch on talk radio I hear utterly hysterical callers make completely contradictory demands which make no sense to me.

"They are all as bad as each other", they wail, "We need an election."

Why, if they are all as bad as each other, do we need an election? What would such an election achieve? To elect another party who are "just as bad" as the party we have now but at least have a different name?

That's the logic which Cameron is hoping will carry him into Downing Street.

I think Brown should be allowed the time to fix the system in which such abuse was allowed to happen. I think he is being unfairly tarnished for crimes which he has not committed but which others, including many Tories, have.

And that's why today, despite the cacophony of "Brown must go" screeching out of all of our radio sets, I will go to my local polling station and give Brown my vote.

What they are doing to this man is simply unfair. So, even if he only garners one vote in the whole of west London, he will get mine.

Wednesday, June 03, 2009

Olbermann calls for a quarantine of Fox News.

Olbermann calls for a quarantine of Fox News because Bill O'Reilly has facilitated the murder of George Tiller.

Of course, O'Reilly will never accept responsibility for his part in creating the atmosphere in which this murder took place.

Right wingers often berate TV violence as leading to actual violence within the community, but here O'Reilly insists that there can be no link between his calling Tiller a "baby killer" repeatedly on TV and the horrific act which recently took place.

As Olbermann says, it's time to say enough to the hate filled and clearly dangerous rhetoric which certain Fox News commentators have been indulging in.

This just isn't acceptable any more. And O'Reilly is not even showing an ounce of shame for his part in inciting domestic terrorism.

Fact checking Dick Cheney!

It's astonishing to watch Cheney attempt to back track from his repeated public statements that there was a link between al Qaeda and Iraq.

Here, Chris Matthews and two reporters go through the myriad of lies which Cheney has told and is still telling. For instance, he has recently set himself up as the CIA's greatest defender, despite the fact that both he and Libby went to war with the CIA, claiming that it was somehow their incompetence which was behind their failure to prove that Saddam had WMD. To this end, he even outed Valerie Plame, a covert CIA agent.

As Matthews rightly states, Cheney behaves as if the rest if us have no memory whatsoever.

Disarray in Downing Street.

It really is as bad as anything I have seen in my lifetime.

On a day of chaos in government circles, Jacqui Smith's aides confirmed she would stand down as Home Secretary at the reshuffle, expected soon after local and European elections tomorrow in which Labour fears a meltdown.
Ms Smith is not the only MP heading for the departure lounge. Tom Watson, a Cabinet Office minister and member of the Brown inner circle, surprised Labour MPs by announcing he would leave the Government.

Beverley Hughes, the Children's minister, and Patricia Hewitt, the former health secretary, said they would quit Parliament at the general election. So did David Chaytor, a Labour backbencher who claimed £13,000 in expenses for a mortgage he had paid off. More than 40 Labour MPs have now disclosed they will stand down, reflecting the widespread resignation in the party that it is heading for an inevitable defeat.

The irony is that this is now playing out as a Labour party problem, despite the fact that Tories used their expenses claims to do things like clean their moats.

And there are now open threats that attempts will be made to remove Brown if the results of Thursday's European elections are as bad as expected, although I really don't know what good this will do.

The Tories have already feigned amnesia over the fact that John Major took over from Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister without a general election taking place, when they expressed their outrage at Brown replacing Blair and refusing to go to the polls. One can only imagine the noise they would make should Labour replace their leader for a second time.

And, ironically, Brown has actually been more on the ball than his conservative counterpart during the recent financial crisis:

What we read and hear less often is that the full picture is a little more complex. For a start there are signs that the Government's controversial hyper-activity in response to the collapse of the financial markets is working. Not so long ago banks were within hours of going bust and house prices were falling faster than the personal ratings of Gordon Brown. Last week it was reported that house prices have started to rise again.

Some retailers continue to register a surprising amount of activity. No bank has closed. The Government should have acted more swiftly in taking over Northern Rock and been much more prescriptive with the banks. It has made many mistakes. Nonetheless, the Conservatives opposed the takeover of Northern Rock and argued for a cut in public spending rather than a fiscal stimulus at the darkest point in the recession.

I know that the public have little time for such matters as global financial recession and are currently obsessed with MP's expenses claims, but even here the Tories do not come off any better than their Labour counterparts, which makes Brown's dilemma all the more strange.

He is being blamed for a culture which he did not instigate, and people are ignoring the things which he did very well.

But, if the Labour party think that their problems will be fixed by his swift replacement, then they are wrong. Replacing Brown will only exacerbate the problem and lead to a general election which Labour are guaranteed to lose.

UPDATE:

Hazel Blear has just announced her resignation in what is clearly a deliberate attempt to damage Brown on her way out of the door.

Communities Secretary Hazel Blears has resigned from the cabinet.
She has been under fire over her expenses and was tipped for the axe in a reshuffle expected after European and English local elections on Thursday.

The Salford MP, a former Labour Party chairman, paid back just over £13,000 after claims that she avoided capital gains tax over a property sale.

She denied doing anything wrong but Gordon Brown described her expenses claims as "unacceptable".
BBC political editor Nick Robinson said the timing of her resignation, on the eve of important elections, appeared to be a "deliberate" attempt to "destabilise" Mr Brown, which had left him "fighting for his political life".

This is the Blairite body of the party taking their revenge on Brown.

It would have been bad enough if we had these resignations the day after an election at which Labour got demolished, but to do so the day before the election as Blears has done is actually to ask the country not to vote for Labour.

Hazel Blears is an utter bloody disgrace. The Labour party are now committing suicide in front of our eyes.

Click title for full article.

Netanyahu cites secret deal with Bush to justify more settlements.

The rift between the governments of the United States and Israel looked set to intensify yesterday as Netanyahu sought to justify his wish to continue settlement expansion by citing a secret deal between his predecessor and the Bush administration that construction in existing Jewish settlements could continue.

Why am I not remotely surprised that Bush would have been doing sneaky deals which allowed Israel to take actions which are utterly illegal under international law? And how naive is Netanyahu if the thinks that Obama is duty bound to honour secret deals agreed by the man who Obama was elected to succeed under a banner of "change"?

The Israeli government is arguing that Ariel Sharon, with reservations, agreed in 2003 to the internationally endorsed Road Map and the withdrawal of 8,000 settlers from Gaza in 2005, only on condition that Israel could proceed with expansion within the physical boundaries of existing West Bank settlements. A senior Israeli official familiar with the current talks with the US said: "When the government of Israel adopted the Road Map... it was based on understandings reached with the US. It is hard for the US to say we have to keep to our commitments but ignore the understandings."

The argument was being pressed in talks that Israel's Defence Minister Ehud Barak was holding in Washington yesterday and is likely to feature in discussions that the US Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, is expected to have with the Israeli leadership here on Monday. Israeli officials are braced for President Obama to repeat his call for a settlement freeze when he makes his major speech on US relations with the Muslim world in Cairo tomorrow.

Israeli officials also complain that the new team in Washington is making "no distinction" between settlements in the larger blocs that Mr Bush told Mr Sharon in 2004 he expected would be in Israeli territory in any final status deal with the Palestinians, and those elsewhere in the occupied West Bank. Although the Bush administration later "clarified" that borders were a matter for negotiation, Israel swiftly assumed it was entitled to continue building within such blocs.

So, Israel now claims that "understandings" were reached which went utterly against the commitments she made in public. After all, Israel's public commitments issued through the Road Map couldn't have been any clearer.

From the Road Map, phase one:

In Phase I, the Palestinians immediately undertake an unconditional cessation of violence according to the steps outlined below; such action should be accompanied by supportive measures undertaken by Israel. Palestinians and Israelis resume security cooperation based on the Tenet work plan to end violence, terrorism, and incitement through restructured and effective Palestinian security services. Palestinians undertake comprehensive political reform in preparation for statehood, including drafting a Palestinian constitution, and free, fair and open elections upon the basis of those measures. Israel takes all necessary steps to help normalize Palestinian life. Israel withdraws from Palestinian areas occupied from September 28, 2000 and the two sides restore the status quo that existed at that time, as security performance and cooperation progress. Israel also freezes all settlement activity, consistent with the Mitchell report.

The Road Map demanded very little from the Israelis and quite a lot from the Palestinians, indeed, apart from asking that Israel withdraws from "areas occupied from September 28, 2000", which is hardly asking her to return to the 1967 border, the only demand made of Israel under Bush's map is that she "freezes all settlement activity."

Netanyahu is now claiming the Bush and Sharon came to a secret deal so that Sharon did not have to do the one thing that he was agreeing to do under the Road Map.

If anything highlights how biased and pro-Israeli the Bush administration was - and how much a change is needed in the American approach to solving this dispute - it is this. Netanyahu is now claiming that Israel had a deal with Bush not to do the one thing which they publicly agreed to do. So, they had a dozen points which they could demand the Palestinians must achieve or Israel could walk away from the road map - comprehensive political reform, drafting a Palestinian constitution, ensuring free and fair elections in the Occupied Territories - and Israel had only one; stopping all settlement activity, which Netanyahu now claims Israel had a secret deal guaranteeing that she could ignore this.

In other words, Netanyahu is claiming that Israel had a secret deal that the commitment she was giving publicly was, effectively, worthless. It is blatant that Obama need not be tied to any sleazy deals which the Bush administration may have struck, but that's not why Netanyahu is making this claim. Obama has cited Israel's promises made at Annapolis and has stated that he intends to force Israel to honour them. Netanyahu is now claiming that this public promise was a farce agreed between the previous US and Israeli administrations, even whilst they were publicly vowing to adhere to it.

Obama is making it clear that he is not buying this:

There is no sign that President Obama sees himself bound by any such covert oral understandings reached with his predecessor's administration – the status and durability of which has reportedly been challenged with vigour by US officials. Mr Obama told National Public Radio: "I've said very clearly to the Israelis both privately and publicly that a freeze on settlements, including natural growth, is part of those obligations." He added that Palestinians also had parallel obligations to improve security and end incitement.

The senior Israeli official suggested that Mr Netanyahu was ready to reach an agreement with the US precluding settlement-building that would in his view prejudice final status negotiations with the Palestinians, and that this would include not building on E1, the bitterly controversial planned corridor linking Jerusalem to the large settlement of Ma'ale Adumim. The official rejected reports of a secret coalition agreement between Mr Netanyahu and his hard-right Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, to resume E1-building.

So, Netanyahu's idea of meeting someone halfway is to offer to stop only the most "bitterly controversial" settlement building?

Netanyahu really doesn't get this. The kind of sleazy hidden deals - which utterly changed the essence of publicly made pronouncements - is exactly the kind of thing which Obama was elected to change. Obama couldn't be any clearer that all settlement building means all settlement building.

And any deals made with the former administration carry no validity whatsoever.

If anything shows the need for change in the way the US behaves towards the Israelis and the Palestinians, Netanyahu has clearly pointed it out. The US used to be the "honest broker" in this dispute but ended up, as Netanyahu is making clear, as nothing short of an enabler for Israel's illegal settlement building.

Obama was elected as a new broom to sweep away this kind of sleazy back room dealing where people said one thing in public whilst agreeing the utter opposite in private.

Any deal struck with Bush in private, and undermining public promises both Bush and Sharon were making, were an arrangement between those two men and were valid only as long as they both held office.

Israel remains bound by the public promise which she made.

Although, after Netanyahu's claims, I am left wondering why anyone would ever again believe any public promise which either Israel or the US ever make, as apparently if you cross your fingers behind your back whilst making the promise then it really doesn't count.

Netanyahu really is claiming that you can say one thing in public and another, utterly opposite, thing in private and the latter should have validity but not the former. And people wonder why the public are losing faith in politicians?

Click title for full article.

Tuesday, June 02, 2009

General Sanchez: Torture Investigation Needed! Abu Ghraib Orders Came From The Very Top!

The Bush regime always urged that we should listen to the generals. Well, they should listen themselves to General Sanchez who is now saying that he supports the formation of a truth commission. He seems prepared to allow the chips to fall where they may.

He also states that "soldiers must never be abandoned on the battlefield again, as mine were."

Sanchez' soldiers famously included Lynndie England and Charles Graner who were prosecuted, they say for following orders.

When the General in charge of the entire Iraq operation calls for an investigation into what took place, it really must be becoming impossible for an investigation to be avoided.

Cheney Needs To Realize The War Is Over And He Lost! Sen Bob Graham

I watched earlier as the Liz and Dick show came to it's inevitable conclusion, with a joint appearance on Fox.

My favourite moment is when Cheney states, talking about the Obama administration, that "the new administration have fallen a little short" on the subject of transparency.

Liz pipes in. "Hypocrisy is something the American people can smell."

I'm sure they can, Liz. Indeed, I'm sure they realise the irony in the most secretive Vice President in history calling out Obama on the subject of transparency.

In this video Rachel Maddow looks at another recent Cheney speech in which he has suddenly admitted that there was no link between Iran and al Qaeda. He also attempts to shove Tenet under the bus by blaming him for the information on which the Iraq war was based. Cheney, naturally, wishes us to ignore his many visits to the CIA and the fact that he was personally applying pressure for the CIA to find evidence which would justify a war which Cheney and others were determined to wage.

Tenet did not make the decision to go to war, that was made by Bush with Cheney's encouragement.

It's pathetic to watch Cheney attempt to place the blame on Tenet's shoulders.

FOX News Haters Are Blaming Us!

I knew that Fox News would instantly go on the defensive over the murder of George Tiller.

As I said yesterday:

And I know we will now hear from the right that this was done by one unhinged individual and that everyone has to take responsibility for their own actions. But that's sort of my point.

People also have to take responsibility for creating the feeling that the democratic process has resulted in America being taken from it's people and from this constant encouragement that the people need to "do something". Much as I find it gross to watch Glenn Beck constantly weep for what he imagines has been done to US, there are people out there who take that shit seriously.

O'Reilly and others have been urging that US citizen's need to "do something" ever since Barack Obama was elected. Glenn Beck weeps on air that he just wants his country back and fantasises about militias forming so that the people can bring down this fascism/socialism/national socialism or whatever other term Beck chooses on any particular day. It's clear that he is pig ignorant on what each of these political philosophies entails as the seems to regard them all as interchangeable. The only unifying theme he espouses is that Obama's government must go. And, if the people have to rise up in violence to bring this about, one has the distinct feeling that Beck would feel his work was done here.

It's typical of the kind of lunacy which infects Fox News. I don't even think they mean the crap they say but they have worked out that enraging people is good for ensuring viewing figures, so they enrage people daily with no thought to the consequence.

Here Billo invites two guests on to the show to exonerate him from any consequence of the hatred that he preaches.

However, listening to O'Reilly list the amount of abortions Tiller has performed and the amount of money he has earned, it's impossible to believe that he is expressing any genuine sorrow about what has happened here.

UPDATE:

Here is how O'Reilly used to talk about Tiller before he was murdered.

The Independent calls for a coup.

I listened to LBC radio last night in incredulity as the presenter asked if the Queen should step in and dissolve parliament so that a general election could be forced in Britain, as the public - so they claim - have lost all faith in both political parties.

Leaving aside the fact that I don't think such power is actually within the Queen's remit, I was left wondering who the public are supposed to vote for if they have, as claimed, lost faith in both political parties. Are we seriously saying we must have a general election so that the Liberals can form the next government? I think not. We all know that were there to be an election tomorrow that it is Cameron's Tory party who would sweep into power.

Which is why I am so surprised to see this morning's Independent leader column, arguing that "drastic action is now needed to secure a general election".

When does a government forfeit the moral right to govern? It is a question that has an uncomfortable relevance in Britain today. Labour emerged from the 2005 general election with a solid, if unspectacular, mandate to govern Britain. Yet that mandate has been draining away at an alarming rate ever since. And now, with Labour on course for a disastrous performance in Thursday's European elections, the party's authority is on the verge of being wiped out altogether. If the Government's democratic credibility looked shaky before, the expenses scandal of recent weeks has blown its moral authority apart entirely.

The paper makes a token effort to show that this crisis is not one for the Labour party alone, but seems to argue that the party in power pays the price for the crisis no matter how right or wrong that seems.

It is rather unfair for Labour to suffer more than other parties in the expenses fall-out; MPs of all affiliations have abused the system. But Labour is the biggest party in the Commons. With greater representation comes greater scrutiny.

The Independent then argues that a general election is a matter of urgency and provides only the worst reasoning as to why this government might want to continue. Arguing that the cabinet might force Brown out of office, they state:

However, what makes such a coup less likely is the desire of Labour MPs, many of whom would be facing defeat even with a new leader, to hang on to their salaries for another year.

This would, suffice to say, be the most dishonourable justification of all for allowing this broken administration to stagger on. It would confirm every suspicion of the public about the self-serving rapaciousness of MPs.

I am simply stunned that The Independent are making this argument. I know that LBC have been feasting on the MP's expenses scandal for weeks now; but only yesterday James O'Brien, one of their talk jocks, was speculating about how hard it was to keep public anger going on this matter.

The assumption made by the Independent is that this is a problem which can only be sorted by a general election, a general election which we all know the Tories would win, despite their being just as embroiled in this scandal as their Labour counterparts. The Independent's justification, that, "with greater authority comes greater scrutiny" is absolute bollocks.

Quite why this newspaper has decided to embrace the arguments of right wing radio shock jocks is utterly lost on me.

Their letters pages over the next few days are bound to be interesting. We now have a leading progressive British newspaper demanding that a British cabinet pull off a coup which removes their own party from power. That's simply astonishing.

Click title for Independent leader column.

Obama hopeful on Mid-East peace.

Obama talks to the BBC about the Israel/Palestine crisis.

And he reminds the world, once again, that Israel has made commitments at Annapolis that he intends to hold them to, despite the fact that Netanyahu has made clear that he will not be held to those commitments. The question, obviously, is what does Obama do now.

Justin Webb attempts to tie him down, asking if he will do what George Bush's father did and threaten to curb US aid to Israel, but, unsurprisingly, Obama refuses to be forced into showing his hand on this matter.

"Not only is it in the interest of the Palestinian people to have a state, it's in the interest of the Israeli people to stabilise the situation there," he said.

"And it's in the interest of the United States that we've got two states living side by side in peace and security."

Asked about Israel's rejection of his call for a halt to Jewish settlements in the West Bank, the president urged patience, saying it was early in the conversation.

"Diplomacy is always a matter of a long hard slog. It's never a matter of quick results," he said.

He repeats that it is in Israeli and American interests that this situation is resolved and he appears to remain terribly confident that he can pull this off, although I don't see how it can happen without the collapse of the Netanyahu government, but if that's an aim it's obviously not one which he is going to articulate here.

What's clear is that he is articulating a link between the Israel/Palestine conflict and American security. That is redefining the way we should look at this conflict. He is telling Americans that they pay a price in terms of their security for what happens in the Middle East.

This is a serious change. He is not allowing this to be portrayed simply in the usual terms that Israel's supporters would like to see this in. Normally this is portrayed as, "They want to drive us into the sea", which means that every Israeli action has to be forgiven because it is set against such an apocalyptic background. Obama is saying that it is dangerous for Americans for the status quo to continue. It's a totally new approach to this conflict, and it's one which Netanyahu appears to be flustered by.

And, as Netanyahu flaps about, Obama seems to remain confident and determined that he can pull this off. I find that strangely comforting. He's obviously got a plan and he has Hillary and the pro-Israeli senators behind him. We'll just have to wait and see this plan as it plays out.

But, I wish him well. And I really hope he can pull this off. So far, he has not disappointed me on this issue.

Monday, June 01, 2009

Ralph Peters: Kill Them All!

Ralph Peters has shown himself to be off his head in so many different ways that I have lost count, but, even by his low standards, this appearance on the Neil Cavuto Show is a new low.

Here he argues that terrorists should simply be killed on the spot. His basis for this is that al Qaeda don't treat US soldiers according to the Geneva Conventions.

It's simply extraordinary to me that he should seek to lower the US Army to the level of a terrorist group and think that this was somehow acceptable. I mean is he seriously arguing that this should be the standard against which the US Army measures itself? Al Qaeda?!?

He's also ignoring the fact the majority of people held at Guantanamo Bay were released by the Bush administration, people who would now be dead were his philosophy to have been followed, something which he dismisses with, "There will be miscarriages of justice, in a brutal war like this, but I don't think too many." Actually, there would have been upwards of 500 according to how many detainees Bush released.

It's the first time I've seen Cavuto at a loss for words. As he tries to wind up the interview, Peters shows that his meds have properly kicked in by suddenly exclaiming, "Fight for human rights, kill terrorists!"

Quite one of the most bonkers TV appearances by any Republican in a long time, and considering the fact that we are presently living through the Sotomayor season, that really is saying something. John Bolton must be feeling upstaged.

Maher on Sotomayer.

Bill Maher on the Sotomayer scandal.

The last time Rush Limbaugh talked to an Hispanic woman, it was his maid getting him his drugs. And yet Rush and his ilk have come up with a name for the first Hispanic on the Supreme Court, a Supreme Court that has been 99% white men for 200 years; and that name is "reverse racist". She is a racist and someone has to stop her because for too long white men have been kept down by powerful Puerto Rican women.

Maher always makes me laugh.

Leahy: Attacks on Sotomayer are "baloney"!

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

I am with Leahy when he states that the charges against Sotomayer are "baloney". And, I think it's really going to hurt the Republicans if they continue down the route which they are presently on.

However, there are some Republicans who appear to have recognised this and are calling for the party to step back from this particular precipice.

"Unless there's something that comes out that's very much out of the ordinary, this is likely to be a smooth confirmation if Republicans are smart politically," said John Ullyot, a Republican strategist who served seven years as a senior Senate staffer.
President Barack Obama's Republican critics have -- so far -- shown only a meager appetite for a fight. Indeed the outcome may already be written because Democrats have the 60 votes needed to push the nomination through.
And Republicans worry that overly hostile questioning could further hurt the party with Hispanic voters, who went 67 percent to Obama and 31 percent to his Republican rival, Senator John McCain, in the 2008 White House race.
"Politically, it's better to conserve our powder and live to fight another day and not pick a fight that a) we know we can't win, because we don't have the votes and b) could really hurt us politically," Ullyot told AFP.

They don't have the votes, they are going to alienate themselves from women and Hispanics, and the entire thing is manufactured outrage.

It would be insane for them to push on with this, but they've shown their insanity many times before now. If they've half a brain they will back off. If for no other reason than they simply can't win. So why alienate so many people by throwing around this ridiculous racism charge?

I note that even people like Jeff Sessions are now saying that he would prefer if people stopped calling her a racist. They threw the shit at the wall and some of them appear wise enough to realise that it's not sticking.

Shooting of US abortion doctor shocks Obama.

Obama went to Notre Dame recently and asked that both sides try to avoid extremist positions in the abortion debate. He has got his answer from the rabid right wing:

Violence returned to the abortion debate in the United States yesterday when a doctor who has long been the target of right-to-life activists was gunned down and killed in a church in Kansas where he was an usher.
Lawyers for George Tiller, a 67-year-old doctor who has long been one of only a few in the US willing to perform so-called "late-term" abortions, confirmed that he had been killed in the attack, which happened as he walked into the Reformation Lutheran Church in his home town of Wichita.

Last night Obama was said to be "shocked and outraged" over the killing.

When I listen to some of the extremist positions the right occupy, and watch the way that their anger is being fueled by the Limbaugh's and O'Reilly's and Malkins of this world, and listen to them being told by Glenn Beck that they have to "do something" before their country is taken from them, my only surprise is that this kind of thing doesn't happen more often.

There were clips of Sarah Palin's rally audience during the campaign which I found terrifying. Here were a group of people, who were clearly not the brightest of the bunch, being told that the man the Democrats were putting up for president was "palling around with terrorists."

Cries of "Kill him!" and "Terrorist!" became almost routine at these events.

And I know we will now hear from the right that this was done by one unhinged individual and that everyone has to take responsibility for their own actions. But that's sort of my point.

People also have to take responsibility for creating the feeling that the democratic process has resulted in America being taken from it's people and from this constant encouragement that the people need to "do something". Much as I find it gross to watch Glenn Beck constantly weep for what he imagines has been done to US, there are people out there who take that shit seriously.

In this clip Beck talks of the people forming militias because income tax has had to be raised to between 80-95% just to pay for what has already been spent.

One guest warns:

"This is going to be violent, people can't afford it anymore. Look, cities are going to look like Dodge city, they are going to be uncontrollable, you're going to have gangs in control, motorcycle marauders, you're not going to have enough police, just like Mexico, to control the situation."

There has been a strand of thought amongst the right which states that the government is "disenfranchising people over and over again" and, as Beck states here, that some people "know the constitution" but feel that "the government has betrayed the constitution and so they will see themselves as people who are standing up for the constitution".

Beck's guest, when asked how one diffuses such a situation, replies:

"I don't think you'd want to diffuse it Glenn, we've had a forty minute programme so far and all of the problems we have talked about in one way or another are the result of the American government either overspending or overreaching".

"Glenn, the second amendment is about, at base, not about hunting or about a militia, but about resisting tyranny. The founders were very concerned about allowing individual citizens weaponry to defend themselves as a last resort against a tyrannical government. I don't think the founders ever considered that there would be a tyranny of incompetence, but I think that what we are facing. And, ultimately, that the right of an American."

Glenn goes on to state that the government, "are betraying the principles of our founders every day that they are in office."

So, the notion that the people will have to take matters into their own hands is one which people like Beck have been pushing for months now.

And now, one lone nutter has done exactly that. And that is down to that lone nutter alone. But there has been an atmosphere created which has made an action like this seem almost inevitable.

UPDATE:

Via Balloon-juice, here are just some of the comments on Freeper:

2. Tiller has committed outrage after outrage and not only gotten away with it, he has made a fortune! Sooner or later this had to happen.

6. What goes around comes around...

8. One less nazi as far as I am concerned.

10. Hope the guy gets away.

20. Obama is going to take advantage of this murder to sieze even more control over our society.

I would not even put it past them to commit this murder themselves, as an excuse to sieze power. Reichstag Fire, and all that...

That's an appalling amount of anger and paranoia. And some people, rather than attempting to calm it down, have been fueling it to gain nothing more honorable than ratings.

UPDATE II:

Another right winger comments. This one via Crooks and Liars:

You have to wonder if the reason why we have a legal system is in order to steal the oxygen from moral vigilantism. You have to wonder if the legal system breaks down whether vigilantism, when all other options fail, becomes a moral imperative.

Again, the notion that vigilantism has become "a moral imperative", the argument that the people have to take the law into their own hands. It's an argument that certain right wing commentators have been pushing for months now.

Click title for full article.