Meet your Orwellian "never-ending war" team of 2007 and beyond. These prominent U.S. Republican politicians and their entourages embarked on a ten-day "codel" of the Middle East during the holiday break last month. Shown above: U.S. Senators schmoozing with Israel's Shimon Peres.
"I recently journeyed to Iraq and Afghanistan as part of a congressional delegation led by Senator John McCain. It was a trip of cargo planes and helicopters, flak jackets and helmets – difficult but very informative." Senator Susan Collins, Press Release, December 29th, 2006
Bush World "New Way Forward"
While some Democratic Party cheerleaders might still be hung-over from celebrating Nancy Pelosi's House take-over, I will bet you all three of my own gonads that the U.S. Senate will go along with the Bush "new way forward" PR plan for Iraq next week. Don't forget, a dozen Senate Democrats voted for the heinous "Military Commissions Act of 2006."
While Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) may have sent a strongly-worded memo to the White House expressing the new majority's campaign trail promises about Iraq, BushCo has never had respect for the "cut and run" Democrats. He's not likely to embrace them now, no matter what the election of 2006 might have indicated about the attitudes of the general populations in the United States.
Remember, Bush threw Donald Rumsfeld off the "Stay the Course" Halliburton Cruise Liner. BushCo certainly did this to appease the political world. But more importantly and pragmatically, the firing of Donald Rumsfeld was in part to appease the uniformed military leadership at the Pentagon. That's all the Democratic Congressional operatives should expect as a freebie from the White House. The rest of 2007 and 2008 will have to be earned by the Democratic Party from hard-knuckled politics -- like they play in the rest of the world -- not this U.S. media bubble bullshit * perpetrated on all of us for the last few decades.
The New Way is the Old Way
The 2005 Bushworld plan for Victory in Iraq has been simply repackaged for another year by the White House Public Affairs / Psyops / Propanganda / Press Corps Media. The Iraq Study Group was an exercise of pure political masturbation, just like the 9/11 Commission Report, The Katrina Report, and the soon to be published children's coloring book called, "My Dog Barney Supports Democracy in the Middle East."
That Barney book is sure to be a big hit in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt. You know ... because they are such democratic nations. They don't sponsor or hide terrorists financiers. They are our so-called moderate Sunni Arab allies to "win the peace." Maybe Condelleeza RIce or John Negroponte can read "The Pet Goat" to both us and them this year while we bury another 3000 military personnel who had to die to find a most final way out of Iraq.
* U.S. Media Bubble bullshit
The McMedia in the U.S. is breath-taking. These politicians participating in the codel / fact-finding mission / political junket barely mention anything beyond the patriotic meet-and-greet photo-ops, or about meeting with Israeli PM Ehud Olmert or other top level Israeli government officials for two days, or touring Israel, except Representative Mark Kirk (shown below). Official press releases on the Senators' web sites are basic McPolitics boiled down to yellow ribbon car sticker: "We support our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan."
The media in Israel is more informative than the corporate media echo chamber in the United States. Read foreign media, like the Jerusalem Post once in a while. At one time, the U.S. State Department used to have an overt intelligence gathering operation that would cull popular opinion from media around the world and issue reports. However, just like the annual terrorism incident report was discontinued under the Bush/Cheney In-Denial Team, so have these media reports. Bush and his crazies are like little kids holding their hands against their ears, shouting "la la la la la la la la ... I can't hear you!" No bad new reports from the government. Victory for the Global War on Terror, despite reality.
The corporate U.S. media establishment echos "Here's what George said today" as gospel with no significant challenge for finding facts or analysis of motivations and strategy. Despite the constant whining of right-wing nutjobs about the liberal bias in the U.S. media, the media is corporate, not biased. They've decided we only have an attention span of 7-seconds before we click away and miss their advertising, so you get soundbytes -- and politicians sell you bumper sticker slogans like "cut and run," "stay the course," "stand-up stand-down," "new way forward," and "victory in Iraq."
When I first started researching the holiday junket for these powerful politicians, one of the first things I wondered after I saw the group photograph was "What does Kirk from Illinois have in common with the others?" The Senators serve on the Armed Services committee, but who is Kirk?
Now, let me be perfectly clear about a few things. My main point for blogging about this today is informational. McCain even likes campaign finance reform. Israel, like any other country in the world, has the opportunity to lobby and influence legislators in our U.S. government. I have some issues concerning the U.S. media, some of these Congress-critters spewing soundbytes, and frankly the fact that we have set up a perpetual, multi-billion dollar, money laundering circle with regard to Israel.
We give (not loan) Israel about $3 billion a year. We have been giving Israel cash for security and humanitarian aid for decades. That's not news. Recently however, the Bush administration is simply giving billions to Israel for military purposes. Who sits on the House appropriations committee? Kirk. Who sits on the Senate Armed Forces committee? The rest of these vacationing fact-finders.
So, the legislators and appropriators authorize billions of your tax dollars to go to Israel. Then, the "Pro-Israel" political lobby spends a few million on the key U.S. politicians to keep them in office and on those powerful Congressional committees. Like any lobby, they just rinse and repeat -- every two, four, or six years.
Bottom Line
I don't know if the Bush World, or the McCain-doctrine, "new way forward" in Iraq may stabilize the security leg of the three-legged stool that the National Security Council put out belatedly in 2005, as the "Victory in Iraq" security-economic-political stool. I've been hopeful for Iraq and highlighted the Kurdistan way forward. McCain is making that argument and making some sense, frankly. The 2005 BushWorld "Victory in Iraq" plan was just a plagiarized War College monogram on counter-insurgency operations. The BushCo new way forward in Iraq is just lessons learned from the Clinton-era Balkans / Kosovo occupation and operations.
At the same time, the McCain-Lieberman support for the "surge" plan that Bush will likely unveil this next week has several significant arguments against it.
First, Vietnam veterans are screaming about repeating the mistakes of another Texas president sending fresh meat to die for political ego.
Second, the "surge" plan is a modified overwhelming force rationale, like the Powell doctrine, except too much time has passed to use it. No do-overs are allowed, nor work in the history of things.
Third, extremely educated and experienced military commanders continue to say that "success in Iraq" has no military solution, but it's political (or social / civil ).
Fourth, the "surge" plan completely ignores the motivations driving the insurgency -- that being that the occupation and the presence of foreign forces on their land and in their cities naturally makes troops a target as the cause for all their troubles.
If Senator Lieberman and Rep Kirk significantly owe their careers to the pro-Israel lobby, perhaps they should recuse themselves from the decision-making process in their branch of government, as judges do in the judicial branch. Perhaps they should at least have the media caveat toward full disclosure: "I work for so-and-so." In addition to their Congressional oaths of office, they serve other masters, too -- just like all other politicians. "We have to win in Iraq to have some push-back against Iran in the region, clash-of-civilizations, and nuclear-Iran means Israel is vulnerable." That is the message you'll hear in 2007.
So, when these esteemed and loyal Americans give learned speeches from think-tanks like AEI or JINSA, and then write articles and op-eds that garner national attention, and the their talking points get boiled down to a headline or bumper sticker slogans for the benefit of Fox News illiterate serfs -- all I can do is walk the dog backwards (tm) to reverse-engineer some truth and motivations.
Last October, I blogged "Iran: Rush to the Next War," because I was worried that the Neocon Bush/Cheney administration might use further escalation of the Oil War into Iran as a political tool. As it turned out, the Mark Foley scandal proved insurmountable for the president's political party to overcome.
Why am I not relieved of my anxieties concerning "the long war" and a wider, regional escalation of it? I do my own research and reach my own conclusions, but Robert Parry seems to share my concerns.
Mainly, it's because the Bush/Cheney administration seems to want it. Despite Americans voting overwhelmingly for Democrats in November to "send a message" to the White House and the Republican party, BushCo ignores the will of the people. Instead, President Bush will reveal his Hail Mary play as his strategy for his way forward in Iraq. He will send more troops to the meatgrinder, rather than withdrawing any.
MSNBC Keith Olbermann has good rant on the upcoming Bush call for more sacrifice (video and transcript). He mentions how Bush keeps moving the goal posts for success in Iraq, but he doesn't bring in the obvious point. That is, of course Bush has to win in Iraq, but not for Bush's ego. The real reason to win in Iraq is to be able to wage a shooting war with Iran.
The real war Bush World wants is with Iran because of it's growing challenge to the United States as a power in the Middle East. It's quite clear that the neocon cheerleaders for war didn't plan for winning the peace in post-invasion Iraq mainly because their eyes were on the next war with Iran.
Meanwhile, the grand neocon plan in the broader Middle East has only hit a snag because of the Bush/Cheney administration's Katrina-like incompetence for the Baghdad mission. Unfortunately, the plan continues as the State Department lines up Sunni Arab states' support for its policies. The Defense Department dispatches another aircraft carrier strike group to the Persian Gulf. The U.S. corporate media establishment, who make money from reporting carnage, is increasingly echoing the plan by hyping the Iran nuclear threat.
Many people far more knowledgeable about world markets than I am think this is the real reason to escalate a war with Iran. Some people use the secular Shia / Sunni issue to divide and conquer. Bush will undoubtedly continue to sell the "nuclear Iran is unacceptable" reason to go to war.
With the U.S. military increasing its presence in the region, it's likely some accidental or planned confrontation with Iran will occur in 2007. Hopefully, the U.S. Navy won't shoot down an Iranian passenger jet this time around. Unfortunately, George Bush has surrounded himself with Reagan-era hawks for the last six years, so anything is possible for the upcoming year.
"When we were young, we never made "to do" lists. We just had dreams." -- J f Z, 07/01/01
There is a correlation between "to do" lists and dreams, though. Some people live by their "to do" lists. At different times in my life, I have lived every day controlled by the notes in a leather-bound day planner. Before I could afford a cool day planner, in college, I used graph paper. At that time, I worked alternatively on afternoons and midnight shifts in a data center, while also going to college full-time during the day.
I can close my eyes today and see my hand-crafted graph paper schedules in my mind. Weekly sheets with every hour in the 24-hour day that I had placed on my refrigerator by magnets. Flourescent highlight markered lines that told me my work schedule, my school schedule, and when I should try to sleep during that 168-hour page.
Unlike a schedule forced upon you by others, when you start a business, you have control over your time. Usually, that can be a relief, just being in control. On the other hand, working for yourself requires far more self-discipline than most people realize. And, oftentimes, you work many more hours for yourself than you'd ever think of working for someone else.
This morning of the New Year, I remember some motivational methods taught to me by some very successful people with whom I've associated in the past and that I plan to use again for myself in 2007. The self-motivating techniques are simple.
Rather than making a "to-do" list for New Year's Resolutions, I will again make my "Dream Book." The Dream Book is different for everyone, but there are some sound psychological principles underlying why it works for anyone. I may even share mine with you, but likely not.
The process/method
First of all, people create reality in the world. That's you and me. So, for example, if your dreams are very, very big, and the underlying reasons why you wish to accomplish a thing is all-encompassing to you, you will do the things along the way that it takes to manifest that reality. There are many examples of one person making world-wide changes.
Rather than saving the world, I want to bring it down to a commonality to explain it more simply. A "to do" style list only describes the "what" of your goals. For example, one might have "lose weight in 2007" as something to accomplish.
However, if you really wish to accomplish that goal, be honest with yourself. Explore it deeper within yourself. Describe not only the "what," but more importantly, the "why" you want to "lose weight in 2007."
As an example, it could go something like this:
My friend has invited me to attend his/her wedding in June. I have to wear a dress/tuxedo. I want to look my best on that day because it will be photographed and videotaped.
That defines the "why" of your weight loss goal. It gives you a deadline. The "what" of "lose weight in 2007" is obvious now. And surprisingly, researchers have documented that if your reason "why" you wish to accomplish that goal is strong enough, you naturally figure out the steps between "what" and "why" with the "how" steps in between, like eat less crap and exercise.
Not only that, if you look at your goals with "why" as your basis for making those goals, your committment for accomplishing those goals are stronger and re-inforced. In this example, that means you'll likely make time to go to the gym or prepare healthier meals for yourself because the "why" is strong enough in your thinking every day to do the "how" and accomplish the "what."
