whether you’re a little devil or a
professional prankster or maybe out for just plain revenge

tonights the night to GET EVIL

How often do we hear the claim that American troops “defend our freedoms”?

Republished from The Future of Freedom Foundation

Unfortunately, it just isn’t so. In fact, the situation is the exact opposite — the troops serve as the primary instrument by which both our freedoms and well-being are threatened.
Let’s examine the three potential threats to our freedoms and the role that the troops play in them:

1. Foreign regimes

Every competent military analyst would tell us that the threat of a foreign invasion and conquest of America is nonexistent. No nation has the military capability of invading and conquering the United States. Not China, not Russia, not Iran, not North Korea, not Syria. Not anyone.

To invade the United States with sufficient forces to conquer and “pacify” the entire nation would take millions of foreign troops and tens of thousands of ships and planes to transport them across the Atlantic or Pacific ocean. No foreign nation has such resources or military capabilities and no nation will have them for the foreseeable future.
After all, think about it: the U.S. army, the most powerful military force in all of history, has not been able to fully conquer such a small country as Iraq because of the level of domestic resistance to a foreign invasion. Imagine the level of military forces that would be needed to conquer and “pacify” a country as large and well-armed as the United States.
I repeat: No foreign nation has the military capability to invade the United States, conquer our country, subjugate our people, and take away our freedoms. Therefore, the troops are not needed to protect our freedoms from this nonexistent threat.

2. Terrorists

Despite widespread fears to the contrary, there is no possibility that terrorists will conquer the United States, take over the government, and take away our freedoms. At most, they are able to kill thousands of people, with, say, suicide bombs but they lack the military forces to subjugate the entire nation or any part of it.

Equally important, while the troops claim that they are protecting us from “the terrorists,” it is the troops themselves — or, more precisely, the presidential orders they have loyally carried out — that have engendered the very terrorist threats against which the troops say they are now needed to protect us.
Think back to 1989 and the years following — when the Berlin Wall fell, East and West Germany were united, Soviet troops withdrew from Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union was dismantled. The Pentagon didn’t know what to do. Unexpectedly, its 50-year-old “official enemy” was gone. (The Soviet Union had previously been America’s “ally” that had “liberated” Eastern Europe from Nazi Germany.) With the fall of the Soviet empire (and, actually, before the fall), the obvious question arose: Why should the United States continue to have an enormous standing army and spend billions of dollars in taxpayer money to keep it in existence?
The Pentagon was in desperate search for a new mission. “We can be a big help in the war on drugs,” the Pentagon said. To prove it, U.S. military forces even shot to death 18-year-old American citizen Esequiel Hernandez in 1997, as he tended his goats along the U.S.-Mexican border. “We’ll help American businesses compete in the world.” “We’ll readjust NATO’s mission to protect Europe from non-Soviet threats.” “We’ll protect us from an unsafe world.”
Then along came the Pentagon’s old ally, Saddam Hussein, to whom the United States had even entrusted weapons of mass destruction to use against the Iranian people, and gave America’s standing army a new raison d’être. Invading Kuwait over an oil-drilling dispute, Saddam provided the Pentagon with a new official enemy, one that would last for more than 10 continuous years.
Obeying presidential orders to attack Iraq in 1991, without the constitutionally required congressional declaration of war, the troops ended up killing tens of thousands of Iraqis. Obeying Pentagon orders to attack Iraq’s water and sewage facilities, the troops accomplished exactly what Pentagon planners had anticipated — spreading deadly infections and disease among the Iraqi people. Continuing to obey presidential orders in the years that followed, the troops enforced what was possibly the most brutal embargo in history, which ended up contributing to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children, deaths that U.S. officials said were ‘’worth it.’‘ Obeying presidential orders, the troops enforced the illegal ‘’no-fly zones’‘ over Iraq, which killed even more Iraqis, including children. Obeying presidential orders, the troops established themselves on Islamic holy lands with full knowledge of the anger and resentment that that would produce among devout Muslims. Obeying presidential orders, the troops invaded and occupied Iraq without the constitutionally required congressional declaration of war, killing and maiming tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis — that is, people whose worst “crime” was to resist the unlawful invasion of their homeland by a foreign power.
All that death and destruction — both pre-9/11 and post-9/11 — have given rise to terrible anger and hatred against the United States, which inspired the pre-9/11 attacks, such as the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, the attack on the USS Cole, and the attacks on overseas U.S. embassies, the 9/11 attacks, and the terrorist threats our nation faces today.
Through it all, the Pentagon simply echoed the claims of the president — that all the death and destruction and humiliation that the U.S. government had wreaked on people in the Middle East, as well as its unconditional military and financial foreign aid to the Israeli government, had not engendered any adverse feelings in the Middle East against the United States. Instead, the president and the Pentagon claimed, the problem was that the terrorists simply hated America for its “freedom and values.”
If the American people had dismantled the nation’s standing army when the Soviet empire was dismantled, the federal government would have lacked the military means to meddle and intervene in the Middle East with unconstitutional military operations, sanctions, no-fly zones, bases, invasions, and occupations. Therefore, there never would have been the terrorists attacks against the United States and a “war on terrorism” for the troops to fight, not to mention the USA PATRIOT Act, secret search warrants and secret courts, the Padilla doctrine, and other federal infringements on our rights and freedoms.
Finally, but certainly important, despite being the most powerful standing army in the world, the U.S. troops were not even able to protect Americans from terrorist acts, as best evidenced by two terrorist attacks on the same target — the World Trade Center, first in 1993 and then again in 2001.

3. The federal government

As our Founding Fathers understood so well, the primary threat to our freedom lies with our own government.

That’s in fact why we have the Constitution and the Bill of Rights — to protect us and our freedoms from federal officials. If the federal government did not constitute such an enormous threat to our freedoms, there would be no reason to have the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
Yet, what is the primary means by which a government takes away the freedoms of its citizenry? Our American ancestors gave us the answer: its military forces. That is in fact why many of our Founding Fathers opposed a standing, professional military force in America — they knew not only that such a force would be used to involve the nation in costly, senseless, and destructive wars abroad but also that government officials would inevitably use the troops to ensure a compliant and obedient citizenry at home.
Consider the words of James Madison:
A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty. The means of defense against foreign danger have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the people.
Here’s how Patrick Henry put it:
A standing army we shall have, also, to execute the execrable commands of tyranny; and how are you to punish them? Will you order them to be punished? Who shall obey these orders? Will your mace-bearer be a match for a disciplined regiment?
Would U.S. troops obey presidential orders to deploy against the American people and take away our freedoms?
There is no doubt about it. Of course they would, especially if the president told them that our “freedom and national security” depended on it, which he would.
As suggested in the article,
‘’The Troops Don’t Support the Constitution,’‘ in the United States the loyalty of the troops is to the president as their supreme commander of chief, not to the Constitution. Recent evidence of this point was the willingness of the troops to obey presidential orders to deploy to Iraq despite the fact that the president had failed to secure the constitutionally required congressional declaration of war.
What if the president ordered the troops to deploy across the United States and to round up “terrorists” and incarcerate them in military camps, both here and in Cuba? Again, there can be no doubt that most of the troops would willingly obey the president’s orders, especially in the middle of a “crisis” or “emergency” because they view themselves as professional soldiers whose job is to serve the president and not to question why but simply to do or die.
Another good example of the allegiance that the troops have toward the president involves the case of U.S. citizen Jose Padilla. Labeling Padilla a “terrorist,” the president ordered the troops to take him into military custody, deny him access to an attorney, and punish him without a trial and due process of law. The troops obeyed without question. Do you know any troops who have publicly protested the Padilla incarceration or who have resigned from the army in protest? How many have publicly announced, “I refuse to participate in the Padilla incarceration because I took an oath to support and defend the Constitution”?
Indeed, how many of the troops resigned in protest at the president’s orders to set up a prisoner camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, knowing that the reason he and the Pentagon chose Cuba, rather than the United States, was precisely to avoid the constraints of the Constitution?
If the troops didn’t protest with respect to Iraq or Padilla or Gitmo, what is the likelihood they would protest when their commander in chief ordered them to arrest 100 other Americans “terrorists,” or 1,000?
I repeat: The troops, from the Pentagon on down, would not disobey orders of the president to disarm and arrest American “terrorists,” especially in the midst of a “crisis” or “emergency.”
And even if some were to protest, they would be quickly shunted aside (probably punished as well) and replaced with those troops whose allegiance and loyalty to the president would be unquestioned.
Now it’s true that soldiers are supposed to disobey unlawful orders, but as a practical matter most of the troops are not going to overrule the judgment of their commander in chief as to what is legal or not. After all, how many troops involved in the torture and sex-abuse scandal refused to participate in the wrongdoing, especially since they thought that it was approved by the higher-ups? Again, how many refused orders to deploy to Iraq despite the fact that there was no constitutionally required congressional declaration of war?
Imagine that the president issues the following grave announcement on national television during prime time: “Our nation has come under another terrorist attack. Our freedoms and our national security are at stake. I have issued orders to the Joint Chiefs of Staff to immediately take into custody some 1,000 American terrorists who have been identified by the FBI as having conspired to commit this dastardly attack or who have given aid and comfort to the enemy. I have also ordered the JCS to take all necessary steps to temporarily confiscate weapons in the areas where these terrorists are believed to be hiding. These weapons will be returned to the owners once the terrorist threat has subsided. I am calling on all Americans to support the troops in these endeavors, just as you are supporting them in their fight against terrorism in Iraq. We will survive. We will prevail. God bless America.”
Now ask yourself: How many of the troops would disobey the orders of the president given those circumstances, especially if panicked and terrified Americans and the mainstream press were endorsing his martial-law orders?
The answer: Almost none would disobey. They would not consider it their job to determine the constitutionality of the president’s orders. They would leave that for the courts to decide. Their professional allegiance and loyalty to their supreme commander in chief would trump all other considerations, including their oath to “support and defend the Constitution.”
Therefore, if the federal government is the primary threat to our freedom, then so are the troops: their unswerving loyalty to their commander in chief makes them the primary instrument by which the federal government is able to destroy or infringe the rights and freedoms of the citizenry.

The solution

No one can deny that we now live in a nation in which the president wields, albeit unconstitutionally, the omnipotent power to send the entire nation into war against another nation — and that he has the means — a loyal and obedient army — to exercise that power.

President Bush made his position clear prior to his invasion of Iraq, when he emphasized that while he welcomed the support of Congress in the event he decided to wage war on Iraq, he didn’t need its approval. His position was reconfirmed by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who informed Congress on October 19, 2005, that the commander in chief’s position was that he did not need the consent of Congress to send the nation into another war, this time against Syria.
No one can deny that we now live in a nation in which the president claims the omnipotent power to jail and punish any American citizen whom the president labels a “terrorist,” denying him due process of law, trial by jury, and other constitutional guarantees — and that he has the means — a loyal and obedient army — to exercise that power.
Thus, as a practical matter the troops serve not as a defender of our freedoms but instead simply as a loyal and obedient personal army of the president, ready and prepared to serve him and obey his commands. It is an army that stands ready to obey the president’s orders to deploy to any country in the world for any reason he deems fit and attack, kill, and maim any “terrorist” who dares to resist the U.S. invasion of his own country. It is also an army that stands ready to obey the president’s orders to take into custody any American whom the commander in chief deems a “terrorist” and to punish him accordingly.
There is one — and only one — solution to this threat to our freedoms and well-being: for the American people to heed the warning of our Founding Fathers against standing armies before it is too late, and to do what should have been done at least 15 years ago: dismantle the U.S. military empire, close all overseas bases, and bring all the troops home, discharging them into the private sector, where they would effectively become “citizen-soldiers” — well-trained citizens prepared to rally to the defense of our nation in the unlikely event of a foreign invasion of our country. And for the American people to heed the warning of President Eisenhower against the military-industrial complex, by shutting down the Pentagon’s enormous domestic military empire, closing domestic bases, and discharging those troops into the private sector.
“Oh, my gosh, if we did all that, how would our freedoms be protected?”
Protected from what? Again, there is no threat of a foreign invasion. And again, terrorism is not a threat to our freedom. Moreover, dismantling the standing army would remove the primary means by which presidents have succeeded in engendering so much anger and hatred against our nation — anger and hatred that in turn have given rise to the threat of terrorism against our nation. And finally, the worst threat to our freedom is our own government, and by dismantling the standing army we would reduce that threat significantly.
What would happen if a foreign nation ever began constructing thousands of ships and planes and mobilizing millions of people to invade the United States? The answer to that threat was also provided by our Founding Fathers: the foreign nation in question would be met by a nation of free well-armed citizens who would be prepared and willing to rally quickly to oppose any invasion and conquest of our nation. Invading a United States filled with well-trained, free men and women would be much like invading Switzerland — like swallowing a porcupine. Don’t forget that the men and women who currently serve in the U.S. armed services wouldn’t disappear; instead they would join the rest of us as citizen-soldiers, people whose fighting skills could be depended on in the unlikely event our nation were ever threatened by invasion by a foreign power.
We should also keep in mind the tremendous economic prosperity that would result from the dismantling of America’s enormous standing army. Not only would all the taxpayer money that is being used to fund the standing army be left in the hands of the citizenry for savings and capital, but all those new people in the private sector would be producing as well, instead of living off the IRS-provided fruits of other people’s earnings. Thus, the economic effect would be doubly positive, and, while weakening the federal government, it would make our nation stronger.
What about foreign monsters, tyrants, oppressors, and conquerors? The answer to that was also provided by our Founding Fathers: Our government would no longer go abroad in search of monsters to destroy, but foreigners suffering oppression and tyranny would know that there would always be at least one nation that would accept them — the United States of America. Rather than police the world, Americans would focus on producing the freest and most prosperous society in history as a model for the world and to which those who escaped tyranny and oppression could freely come.
Of course, those Americans who would nonetheless wish to leave their families and jobs to help oppressed people overseas would still be free to do so.
We should also bear in mind the perverse results of the federal government’s military empire and overseas interventions. World War I brought World War II, which brought the Soviet communist occupation of Eastern Europe, which brought the Cold War, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War, along with an enormous standing army in our country. The Middle East interventions and meddling have brought us terrorism, the war on terrorism, the USA PATRIOT Act, the Padilla doctrine, military torture and sex abuse, and CIA kidnappings and “renditions” to foreign countries for the purpose of proxy torture.
By their fruits, you shall know them.
One vision — the vision of militarism and empire — will bring America more violence, death, destruction, impoverishment, and loss of freedom. The other vision — the vision of a limited-government, constitutional republic with citizen-soldiers — would put our nation back on the right road of peace, prosperity, harmony, and freedom.

Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana
Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana
Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana
Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana
Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana

citx asked “why NOW..why these terror attacks in New Delhi?”

perhaps some “connecting the dots” is in order?

This is a tale about a vote, a strike, and a sleight of hand.
For the past six months the United States and the European Union (EU)
have led a full court press to haul Iran before the UN Security Council
for violating the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NNPT)
by supposedly concealing a nuclear weapons program.
Last month, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
voted to declare Iran in “non-compliance” with the Treaty,
but deferred a decision on referral to the Security Council until Nov. 25.

The Strike

On Sept. 30, more than a million Indian airport and banking workers took to the streets
to oppose a plan to downsize financial establishments and privatize airports,
but also to denounce the ruling Congress Part as “shameful”
for going along with the Sept. 24 “non-compliance” vote in the IAEA.
The strikers were led by four Left parties
that are crucial allies of the Congress-dominated United Progressive Alliance government.
The Alliance controls 270 votes in the Parliament.
The Left holds 64 seats to the Congress Party’s 145.
The Alliance’s other 61 seats come from a diverse group of small parties.
Why was India lining up with the United States and the EU against Iran,
especially since it risked alienating essential domestic allies?
Why would India jeopardize its relations with Iran
while it is engaged in high-stakes negotiations with Teheran
over a $22 billion natural gas deal,
and a $5 billion oil pipeline from Iran to India via Pakistan?
To sort this out one has to go back to early this year
when CIA Director Porter Goss
and U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
testified before Congress that China posed a strategic threat to U.S. interests.
Both men lobbied for a “containment” policy aimed at surrounding and isolating China .
One key piece on this new Cold War chessboard is India,
which under the previous right-wing government saw itself as a political and economic rival to Beijing.
But there was an obstacle to bringing India into the ring of U.S. allies
stretching from Japan in the East, to Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan in Central Asia .
In 1974,
using enriched uranium secretly gleaned from a Canadian- and U.S.-supplied civilian reactor,
India set off an atomic bomb.
New Delhi was subsequently cut off from international uranium supplies
and had to fall back on its own rather thin domestic sources.
Yet another set of barriers was erected following India’s 1998 nuclear blasts.
But the Bush administration realized that if it wanted India to play spear bearer for the United States,
the Indians would need to expand and modernize their nuclear weapons program,
an almost impossible task if they couldn’t purchase uranium supplies abroad.
India produces about 300 tons of uranium a year, but the bulk of that goes to civilian power plants.
According to the 2005 edition of “Deadly Arsenals,”
India presently has between 70 and 110 nuclear weapons,
plus 400 to 500 kilograms of weapons grade uranium on hand.
Given India’s present level of technology, a stockpile of that size can produce about 100 atomic weapons.
Those weapons, however, are fairly unsophisticated, and too big and clunky for long-range missiles.
Nor are Indian missiles yet capable of reaching targets all over China ,
although the Agni III, with a range of 2,000, miles is getting close.

The Sleight of Hand

So here comes the sleight of hand.

On June 28,
Indian Defense Minister Pranab Mukherjee met with Rumsfeld
to sign the U.S.-India Defense Relationship Agreement,
which gives India access to sophisticated missile technology under the guise of aiding its space program.
The defense pact was denounced
by the Communist Party of India/Marxist
—one of the parties in the Alliance’s governing coalition—as “fraught with serious consequences,”
that would end up making India like “Japan, South Korea, and the Philippines,
all traditional military allies of the United States.”
The June agreement was followed by a July 18 meeting
of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President George W. Bush
that ended U.S. restrictions on India’s civilian nuclear power program,
and allowed India to begin purchasing uranium on the international market.
While the Bush administration
is telling the U.S. Congress that the pact will encourage civilian over military uses of nuclear technology,
Manmohan Singh told the Indian Parliament,
“there is nothing in this joint statement
that amounts to limiting or inhibiting our strategic nuclear weapons program.”
Indeed, by allowing India to buy uranium on the open market,
the pact will let India divert all of its domestic uranium supplies to weapons production.
That would allow it to produce up to 1,000 warheads,
making it the third largest arsenal in the world behind the United States and Russia.
Of course there was a price for these agreements:
India had to vote to drag Iran before the Security Council.
The Americans were quite clear
that failure to join in on the White House’s jihad against Teheran
meant the agreements would go on ice.
“ India ,” warned U.S. Rep. Tom Lantos (D-CA),
will “pay a very hefty price for their total disregard of U.S. concerns vis-à-vis Iran.”
So that explains the vote.
But is the Congress Party really willing to hazard its majority in the Parliament
and endanger energy supplies
for the dubious reward of joining the Bush administration’s campaign to isolate Iran and corner the dragon?
Well, a “sleight of hand” can work both ways.
Right after the Sept. 24 vote in the IAEA,
according to the Indian newspaper, Frontline,
the Iranian ambassador to the IAEA told the Indian delegation the natural gas deal was off.
Then President Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad
gave an incendiary interview to the United Arab Emirates based newspaper,
the Khaleej Times ,
threatening retribution against any country that voted against Iran .
A few days later,
the Iranians reversed themselves,
claiming that their President had never actually talked with the Khaleej Times,
and the Indians quickly announced that the gas and pipeline deal was still on.
New Delhi also began hinting that it might change its vote come Nov. 25
(one suspects from “yes” to “abstain”).
So either the Indians give Teheran a wink and a nod following their “yes” vote,
or Iran’s shot across their bow had an effect.
The Sept. 24 vote was 22 “yes,” 1 “no,” and 12 abstentions.
China and Russia abstained but have publicly said that they are opposed to sending Iran to the Security Council.
Two of the “yes” votes are rotating off the 35-member IAEA board to be replaced by Cuba and Belarus .
And much to the annoyance of the United States,
Britain, France, and Germany met earlier this month to discuss restarting direct talks with Teheran.
In short, it is unlikely that Iran will end up being referred to the Security Council.
Will an “abstain” vote by India be enough
to open the gates for U.S. technology to ramp up New Delhi’s nuclear weapons programs?
Probably, but that depends on whether the administration can get it by Congress and people like Lantos.
Does this mean India joins the U.S. alliance against China?
The answer to that question is a good deal more complex.
In April of this year India and China signed a “Strategic and Cooperative Partnership for Peace and Prosperity,”
and trade between the two up-and-coming Asian giants is projected to reach $20 billion by 2008.
Following the July agreement with the United States,
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh reported to Parliament that
“we see new horizons in our relationship with China,” and that the pact “is not at the cost of China.”
In fact, in the end the United States may just end up getting snookered.
The Indians feel they need to modernize their military in order to become more than a regional power.
If the Americans will help them do it, fine.
But that doesn’t mean signing on for the whole program.
As analyst Lora Saalman writes in Japan Focus ,
“The technical and military hardware provided by the United States
promises to expand India’s political, strategic, and military footprint even beyond China,”
but that rather than pitting the two huge Asian powers against one another,
“the United States may be setting up India to instead serve
as a future strategic counterweight to U.S. interests in Asia and abroad.”

regardless..
of any posited explanation
or BLAH..BLAH..BLAH
the effects of this political “intrique”
are SUFFERING and DEATH
mostly for women and children

Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana
Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana
Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana
Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana
Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana Aum Namo Narayana

whenever someone makes TRULY..
i mean straight up WOW…
outrageous public statements

i like to find out a little about ‘em
bearing in mind ..
the president of Iran DOES NOT
control the military
or have the power to wage or declare war.

this post is ACTUALLY a Wikipedia piece.
this is the way the internet SHOULD function
does anybody remember…
card catalogs..searching thru stacks..
i mean to say DOING research with BOOKS.
I LOVE BOOKS..
but Wikipedia is “pure tastefulness”
three cheers for tech that serves.

human genome variation map complete…. all people on earth are 99.9% INDENTICAL

SMIILE..we’re that much closer…..

citx the .1%er

the NICE thing about the 10th anniversary of the National Day of Outrage Against Police Brutality..October 22nd
which takes place in over 77 cities Worldwide..is that it IS a protest..no POLITE behavior or parade etiquette HERE

and of course the day WOULD’NT be complete without a little
POLICE BRUTALITY

the two 80 lb. girls detained..tackled and abused (while in cuffs ON the ground)
turned out to be MINORS..citizenx was a witness..the youth were GUILTY AS CHARGED

the CRIME……FREE SPEECH.

put that in your blog and syndicate it.

the SEGWAY was a bit disappointing TRUE…but

be the FIRST on your block to get CHARGED up!!

P.S. segways redemption?

The statue of Abu Ja`far Al-Mansur (d. 775 AD), the second `Abbasid caliph,
and the builder of Baghdad, was bombed in Baghdad yesterday.

The identity of the culprits is not known.
It is not clear whether extremist Shi`ites or extremist Sunnis were behind the bombing.
You can make scenarios for why this or that group was behind the bombing.
It will be a mystery, in the absence of a claim of responsibility.
Was it symbolic, or were the culprits knowledgeable of Iraqi history,
and the specific role of Abu Ja`far?
Abu Ja`far of course succeeded his brother As-Saffah as caliph of the empire.
This skillful politician was also ruthless and brutal.
But he was not immodest.
According to Malik ibn Anas,
Al-Mansur agreed when told that Abu Bakr and `Umar were the best people, after the Prophet.
For some reason Arab sources often liked to mention that Abu Ja`far’s mother was a Berber, not an Arab.
As-Siyuti in Tarikh Al-Khulafa’ says this about him:
“He killed plenty of people until his kingship was consolidated.”
His relationship with Imam Abu Hanifah was quite complex;
and he later had him arrested, and had him killed
(by poisoned sherbet [the word sherbet is from the Arabic word sharabat–beverages] according to some accounts).
Abu Hanifah’s crime was either that he did not legitimize the rule of Al-Mansur or that he permitted dissent against the caliph.
Abu Ja`far was very miserly with money, and often had patches on his garbs.
He was nicknamed in his time and in the old sources Abu Ad-Dawaniq.
(Plural of daniq, which is 1/6th of dirham, and sometimes used to refer to 1/6th of Dinar.)
The plural of dawaniq is an odd form according to Sibawayh.

ألقاتل المرء على الدانق؟

He was known to ask for accounting of every daniq, according to accounts.
But it can easily be said that he founded the Abbasid state,
as Philip Hitti notes…
in his History of the Arabs
–which despite methodological problems
is far superior to Albert Hourani’s History of the Arab Peoples.
He alienated (to this very day?) many peoples.
He alienated the Persians when he killed Abu Muslim Al-Kharasani
(read the novel on his life by Jurji Zaydan) after using him and taking him as his close advisor.
He invited him to his court, and then ordered that he be attacked with swords
(see At-Tabari’s account).
And when a new sect, Ar-Rawandiyyah, declared Abu Ja`far himself as its God, he was furious.
He persecuted and killed its members (see Al-Mas`udi’s account).
But he also changed the relationship
between the newly founded `Abbasid state
and the descendants of `Ali
when he killed Muhammad An-Nafs Az-Zakiyyah (the pure souled),
who was the son of `Abdullah, the grandson of Hasan Ibn `Ali. Siyuti says about that:
“He was the first to cause sedition between the `Abbasids and the `Alids, while they were one thing before that.”
Abu Ja`far also imposed a dress code on his people, leading Abu Dalamah to say:

“وكنا نرجي من إمام زيادة فزاد الإمام المصطفى في القلانس

Abu Ja`far also wrote poetry (not good):
فان فساد الرأي أن تترددا

Ibn Qutaybah in Al-Imamah wa-s-Siyasah
has an interesting story about Abu Ja`far and Ibn Marzuq (his first political prisoner perhaps).
When Ibn Marzuq challenged the caliph publicly,
Abu Ja`far had him arrested, and yet would summon him at night to spend time with him, and on and on.

In 762, Al-Mansur put the first stone for the building of the new capital of Baghdad.
But there was an old location near Baghdad that was known in Sasanian times as Baghdad (see Al-Ya`qubi).
When Baghdad was being constructed,Al-Mansur said: “This is a good site for an encampment.”
It took 4 years to build Baghdad and it cost around 400,883,000 million dirhams.
It required the work of 100,000 engineers, scientists and construction experts,
who were brought in from Syria and Iraq and other places around the empire.
He called his city the City of Peace, and it was built in round concentric circles,
and for that was known as the Round City.
He had four gates made for the city, and one was known as the Golden Gate because it was made of gold–did you guess that?
Abu Mansur was the first caliph to rely on the advise of astrologers,
and the official astrologer assured him that great things will happen in Baghdad (he did not predict Bush or Saddam).
Al-Mansur died while on his way to perform the pilgrimage.
And when he died, says Ibn Al-Athir, they dug 100 graves for him near Mecca to confuse people.
But he was secretively buried somewhere else so that his enemies would not harm him in death.
So who really bombed the statue of Al-Mansur?
Well, it is obvious.
It could be the Iranians who were mad at what he did to Abu Muslim Al-Kharasani;
or it could be the Shi`ites for what he did to Muhammad An-Nafs Az-Zakiyyah;
or it could be the Sunnis for what he did to Abu Hanifah;
or it could be supporters of Rawandiyyah for what he did to followers of the sect;
or it could be Kurds who did not like the Arab imprint of the legacy of the caliphate
(which had much more than an Arab imprint of course);
or it could be the Americans who wanted to change the history of Iraq.
Or it could be somebody who does not know much about history,
and just thought to DESTROY it.

what a day for news….

US soldiers charged with war crimes by Spanish judge

Tom DeLay arrest warrant issued

and in the citizen x paramutual dept….”who do you like for VP when the Dick resigns?”

Zam Zam, Sudan – Janjaweed militias……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………text stolen from NYT

Janjaweed militias..
have focused their wrath on innocent villagers for most of the two and a half years of the conflict in the Darfur region.
But on Sept. 18, in a scene that aid workers described as something out of a Hollywood western,
the militiamen surrounded the police station along Sudan’s border with Chad,
roughed up the chief and freed several of their members from jail.
The fact that militias trained and armed by the government..
are now emboldened enough to turn their guns on the government is a sign of trouble.
It was government support of the janjaweed at the outset that ignited the fighting in Darfur
that killed tens of thousands of people and displaced two million villagers.
The standoff in Geneina,
which together with other incidents prompted the United Nations to evacuate many of its personnel,
is part of an overall deterioration in Darfur.
The conflict has grown even more confused and chaotic in recent months.
Now, rebels fight other rebels,
the ties between some janjaweed fighters and the government have frayed,
and the African Union troops charged with quelling the conflict find themselves targets as well.

”Darfur is no longer under control,” said Eltayeb Hag Ateya, head of the Peace Studies Institute at the University of Khartoum.
“It’s not just the government against the rebels anymore. There’s this armed group and that armed group.
It’s getting more complicated by the day.”
The war here was never a straightforward one.
It was part Arab versus African, part government versus rebel, part nomad versus farmer.
But two rebel forces have now grown to five or more,
with some fighters from neighboring Chad adding to what one aid worker in Darfur called “a cocktail of armed actors.”
Some janjaweed fighters have put on government uniforms.
Others maraud through the countryside taking orders from no one.
With peace talks at a critical stage, the number of fighting forces jockeying for power seems to grow by the day.
Zam Zam, a former village in northern Darfur that has been transformed into a sprawling camp of people on the run from war, is one place that illustrates the new Darfur.
Things in Darfur can be deceptively calm at times
– until hundreds of men on camelback come loping through the sand with their guns blazing.
Or until rebels leap out from their cover in a surprise attack on government troops.
Or until a government aircraft swoops in low.
Darfur’s war began when two rebel groups opened attacks on the government in early 2003,
accusing it of ignoring African tribes of Darfur.
The Islamist government struck back, enlisting the aid of Darfur’s Arab tribes.
The militias destroyed hundreds of villages throughout Darfur,
raping and pillaging as they sought to root out rebels and punish sympathizers.
Zam Zam, created in 2003, grew into one of Darfur’s largest camps for internally displaced people.
It has always been an insecure place, situated strategically near government and rebel strongholds.
But something happened earlier this year that gave aid workers hope that Darfur might be changing for the better.
The population of the camp, which has crept higher and higher since the fighting started, finally began to drop.
In May and June,
hundreds and then thousands of people in Zam Zam and other camps around Darfur began returning home to cultivate their crops,
a sign that normal life was returning to this desperate place.
But the hopeful signs did not last long.
Just last month,
after the villagers had hoed their plots and planted their vegetables and groundnuts and other crops,
the militias attacked again.

”They came with cars, with horses and with camels,” said Ali Mohamed Fadu,
a sheik from Jabein, a village that was overrun on Sept. 17 for the second time in two years.
“They all had guns, and they shot at us and killed some of us.”
The accounts offered by villagers are remarkably similar to the ones heard at the start of the conflict,
when people across Darfur were terrorized in attacks that the United States government said amounted to genocide.
With villagers on the run again,
the population of Zam Zam is back on the rise,
with thousands of new arrivals in the past three weeks.
Ismail Abduraman, 25, lost his father, who was a shopkeeper, in the recent attacks.
After robbing him and shooting him, the militiamen looted his shop.
In all the confusion, Mr. Abduraman became separated from 17 of his brothers and sisters.
While most people in Darfur contend that the countryside is far too dangerous for them these days,
Mr. Abduraman is planning to return in search of his missing family members.
He plans to take a donkey along and walk seven hours to the west, across the scorching sand.
”I have to go,” he said. “I can’t just sit here when my family is out there. My father would go, but he can’t. I’m the elder now.”

Farther east, in Tawila, the situation is similarly grim.
African villagers congregate on the south side of the main road
together with some fighters from the Sudan Liberation Army,
the main rebel movement in Darfur.
To the north is a police station where many of the officers are former militia fighters.
It is an explosive mix that has led to a series of shooting incidents in recent weeks.
Terrified people from the area now huddle next to the African Union camp overlooking the town.
But the African soldiers are hamstrung by their rules of engagement,
their lack of equipment and their inexperience in the field.
When the police recently raided Tawila, shooting at suspected rebels and burning structures in the market,
African Union soldiers watched from their hilltop perch but did not intervene.
It is impossible for them, however, to remain entirely on the sidelines.
An African Union convoy was ambushed on Oct. 8 in the Khorabashi area in South Darfur.
During an exchange of fire, four Nigerian soldiers and two civilian contractors were killed.
A day later, a renegade group of rebels abducted 38 African Union soldiers in the border town of Tine,
warning the African Union not to tread in its territory.
The soldiers were rescued after a battle between rival factions of the Justice and Equality Movement,
which is one of the rebel groups opposed to the Sudanese government in Darfur.
Baba Gana Kingibe,
the African Union’s special representative in Sudan,
said recently that there was “neither good faith nor commitment on the part of any of the parties.”
Perhaps the most horrifying incident in the new Darfur occurred along the Chadian border at the Aro Sharow camp.
On Sept. 28, several hundred janjaweed fighters raided the camp,
killing 35 people and wounding 10 more.
Most attacks occur for a reason here,
and this one is believed to be tied to the killing of a janjaweed leader’s children days before or,
in another version,
the theft of hundreds of camels from Arab tribesmen by rebel fighters.
If there is a hopeful sign in Darfur, it is this: Violence typically spikes in such conflicts when peace talks reach a critical phase.
The negotiations in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital, are in their sixth round, bogged down but not broken.
The recent brutalities are seen as efforts by various fighting forces in Darfur to win a seat at the table
or at least get access to some of the spoils.
But with the reality on the ground so grim,
the traumatized people of Darfur seem to be growing almost numb.
As Mr. Abduraman set off from the relative safety of the Zam Zam camp
to the lawless interior, he had no weapon, little food and no real plan.
He said he left his fate to God.
“If the janjaweed find me, they will kill me,”
he said matter-of-factly as he crouched in the sand.
“I will join my father.”

will she go from MILD to WILD?

The 2005 International Commission of Inquiry on Crimes Against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration of the United States.

When the possibility of far-reaching war crimes and crimes against humanity exists, people of conscience have a solemn responsibility to inquire into the nature and scope of these acts and to determine if they do in fact rise to the level of war crimes and crimes against humanity. That is the mission of the International Commission of Inquiry on Crimes Against Humanity. The first session will be held October 21-22 in New York City. This tribunal will, with care and rigor, present evidence and assess whether George W. Bush and his administration have committed crimes against humanity. Well-established international law will be referenced where applicable, but the tribunal will not be limited by the scope of existing international law.
The tribunal will deliberate on four categories of indictable crimes: 1) Wars of Aggression, with particular reference to the invasions and occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. 2) Torture and Indefinite Detention, with particular reference to the abandonment of international standards concerning the treatment of prisoners of war and the use of torture. 3) Destruction of the Global Environment, with particular reference to systematic policies contributing to the catastrophic effects of global warming. 4) Attacks on Global Public Health and Reproductive Rights, with particular reference to the genocidal effects of forcing international agencies to promote “abstinence only” in the midst of a global AIDS epidemic.
The Commission’s jury of conscience will be composed of internationally respected jurists and legal scholars, prominent voices of conscience, and experts and monitors in relevant fields. The tribunal’s legitimacy is derived from its integrity, its rigor in the presentation of evidence, and the stature of its participants. Representatives of the Bush administration will be invited to present a defense.
Prior to the meeting of the Commission, teams with sufficient expertise will prepare preliminary indictments in each of the four areas, setting forth the scope of the Bush administration’s actions and how they contravene legal and moral norms for international behavior. At the meeting of the Commission, there will be four prosecution teams that organize the presentation of the evidence. This evidence will be documents as well as eyewitness testimony by victims and observers of the crimes alleged. The formal proceedings will be held in a public venue and all attempts will be made to publicize and broadcast its deliberations internationally. The Commission’s jury of conscience will come to verdicts and its findings will be published.
The holding of this tribunal will frame and fuel a discussion that is urgently needed in the United States: Is the administration of George W. Bush guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity? The Commission will conduct its work with a deep sense of responsibility to the people of the world.
The Commission is sponsored by the Not In Our Name statement of conscience, joined by the following individuals and organizations:
• James Abourezk, former United States Senator
• As’ad AbuKhalil, professor of politics & public administration, California State University-Stanislaus
• Dirk Adriaensens, Brussells Tribunal executive committee and coordinator SOS Iraq
• Dr. Nadje al-Ali, social anthropologist at the University of Exeter, founding member of Act Together: Women’s Action on Iraq and member Women in Black UK
• Anthony Alessandrini, organizer with the World Tribunal on Iraq and New York University Students for Justice in Palestine
• Edward Asner
• Russell Banks, novelist
• The Rev. Luis Barrios, Ph.D., associate professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice & Anglican Priest
• Amy Bartholomew, professor of law at Carleton University
• Greg Bates, Common Courage Press
• Phyllis Bennis, Institute for Policy Studies
• Michael S. Berg, grieving father of Nick Berg killed in Iraq May 7, 2004, and one man for Peace
• Ayse Berktay, from the organizing team of the World Tribunal on Iraq
• William Blum, author of Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II and Rogue State: A Guide to the World’s Only Superpower
• Francis Boyle, author of Destroying World Order and professor at the University of Illinois College of Law
• Jean Bricmont, Brussells Tribunal executive committee
• Marjorie Cohn, professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law and executive vice president of National Lawyers Guild
• Lieven De Cauter, Brussells Tribunal executive committee
• Patrick Deboosere, Brussells Tribunal executive committee
• Michael Eric Dyson
• Peter Erlinder, William Mitchell College of Law and lead defense counsel, United Nations Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, Arusha, Tanzania
• Larry Everest, author of Oil, Power & Empire: Iraq and the U.S. Global Agenda and Behind the Poison Cloud: Union Carbide’s Bhopal Massacre
• Richard Falk, professor emeritus of International Law, Princeton, and Visiting Professor in Global and International Studies, UC-Santa Barbara
• Thomas M. Fasy, MD, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York City
• Lawrence Ferlinghetti, member, American Academy of Arts & Letters and founder & editor in chief, City Lights Books, San Francisco
• Ted Glick, former coordinator, Independent Progressive Politics Network
• Dr. Elaine C. Hagopian, former president of Association of Arab-American University Graduates (AAUG) and primary founder of the Trans-Arab Research Institute (TARI)
• Sam Hamill, director, Poets Against War
• International Movement for a Just World (JUST), Malaysia
• Abdeen Jabara, past president, American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee
• Dahr Jamail, U.S. independent journalist who has reported extensively from Iraq since the invasion
• C. Clark Kissinger, contributing writer for Revolution and initiator of the Not In Our Name statement of conscience
• The Reverend Doctor Earl Kooperkamp, Rector, St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, West Harlem, New York City
• Joel Kovel, editor-in-chief, Capitalism Nature Socialism: A Quarterly Journal of Socialist Ecology, and author of The Enemy of Nature
• Jesse Lemisch, professor of history emeritus, John Jay College of Criminal Justice
• Rabbi Michael Lerner, editor of Tikkun magazine and author of The Left Hand of God: Taking Back America from the Religious Right
• New Jersey Civil Rights Defense Committee
• New Jersey Workers Democracy Network
• National Lawyers Guild
• National Lawyers Guild, San Francisco Bay Area Chapter
• Rev. Davidson Loehr, Ph.D., First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin, Texas
• Robert Meeropol, Executive Director, Rosenberg Fund for Children
• Barbara Olshansky, deputy legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights and author of Secret Trials and Executions
• James Petras, professor emeritus of sociology at Binghamton University, New York
• Jeremy Pikser, screenwriter
• Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights and author with Ellen Ray of Guantanamo: What the World Should Know
• Stephen F. Rohde, civil liberties lawyer and co-founder of Interfaith Communities United for Justice and Peace
• Marc Sapir MD, MPH, co-convener of the UC Berkeley Teach In on Torture and executive director of Retro Poll
• Sister Annette M. Sinagra, OP
• State of Nature on-line magazine
• Inge Van de Merlen, Brussells Tribunal executive committee
• Gore Vidal
• Anne Weills, civil rights attorney in Oakland, National Lawyers Guild
• Leonard Weinglass, criminal defense attorney
• Naomi Weisstein, professor emeritus of Neuroscience, State University of NY at Buffalo
• Howard Zinn, historian
• Citizen X

is preparedness in your future?

FUN courtesy of 1st ave machine.com

south central farmers are STANDING THEIR GROUND

foodF¡RST!

monkey-boy picks a winner!

Top-ranking Americans have told equally top-ranking Indians in recent weeks that the US has plans to invade Iran before Bush’s term ends