War's travel companion, Disease, is stalking Baghdad. This disease, cholera, is totally preventable and easily treatable under ordinary circumstances. Of course these aren't ordinary circumstances. Thanks to the invasion and the subsequent US occupation and the resistance to it there has been a total breakdown in civil order. The result is the kind of epidemic disease one associates with Victorian London or mid-19th century America, not a 21st century (once) developed country:
A cholera epidemic in northern Iraq has infected approximately 7,000 people and could reach Baghdad within weeks as the disease spreads through the country's decrepit and unsanitary water system, health officials said.The World Health Organization reported that the epidemic is concentrated in the northern regions of Kirkuk and Sulaimaniya and that 10 people are known to have died. But Said Hakki, president of the Iraqi Red Crescent Society, which has responded to the epidemic, said Tuesday that new cases had turned up in the neighboring provinces of Erbil and Nineweh, indicating that the disease had spread.
Most significant, Hakki said, were two cases in a village between Kirkuk and Diyala provinces, one involving a young girl. Baghdad is next to Diyala. (International Herald Tribune)
Cholera is expected to make its way to the capital by late September or early October. There is a shortage of chlorine because insurgents have used it as a weapon. Chlorine is extremely toxic and was used in World War I. as a poison gas. Since even rudimentary protection of water supplies doesn't seem possible, the solution was to curtail chlorine imports. Instead we have cholera.
Cholera is primarily a waterborne disease that kills by sudden dehydration of its victims from a profuse, watery diarrhea. It can be prevented by simple disinfection of the water supply with chlorine and treated with oral rehydration. That neither of these can be readily accomplished in US occupied Iraq, where the occupiers expend $300 million a day to kill people, speaks volumes.
Bloody, stupid, criminal, insane. And indefensible.
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As a consequence of destroying the country's infrastructure, this would have been foreseen. News coverage of the destruction never once to my knowledge pointed out that the Coalition of the Willing were concentrating on civilian targets, not military targets.
Rumsfeld directed the destruction of their phone system. Why? So that contractors could replace the old landline system with a new cellular system. This is known as creating an instant market.
Rumsfeld directed the destruction of their water supply, fuel supply, food supply, electrical power supply -- and their sewage treatment plants. Why? So contractors would make billions rebuilding the infrastructure.
In 50 years or so, they'll have the job complete. Or not.
It will be interesting to see the major news media avoid covering the cholera epidemic.
In his new book, The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World, the former Federal Reserve chairman, Alan Greenspan, enunciates a "politically inconvenient truth" for all those who've given the Bush administration the power to behave as they have -- that the Iraq war "is largely about oil"...
And so, all those little Iraqi kiddies who die from cholera cos "chlorine imports have been curtailed"!?! Nah, as long as the AmericanOz folk can drive their SUVs to the pump and purchase relatively cheap petrol... Nah, as long as these same folk can drive to the boozer and grab a carton of beer for the High Def plasma tv sporting events... Nah, as long as the serotonin (SSRI) overloaded SUV driving Mom can pick up Johnny and Sally from school... Nah, as long as tv news fails to report harsh reality!
It's another example of the Iraqi people not taking responsibility into their own hands revere. To constantly blame the U.S. for problem's that surface is not a solution.
No chlorine? Boil the drinking water or filter it through cloth.
What's the first thing one is told when they go to Mexico? "don't drink the water"
It shouldn't be happening, I'll give you that however, when you have deluded maniacal extremists disrupting nearly every good deed done by the U.S. or other allies what can be expected?
And not to change the subject but Jon S., we are all greatly misinformed about the truth of the matter on any given subject circulating around this globe at any given moment.
The Toyota dealer can't keep enough hybrid's in stock in the state we live in. The hybrid's are selling like hot cakes on a cold winter day. Also this summer the selling of Vespa's made one young entrepreneur suddenly quite financially stable after he opened his store.
Lea: Filtering through cloth won't do a thing. Boiling requires power, which they have only some of the time. BTW, have you ever drunk boiled water? Try it. It tastes terrible and if you don't know your water is contaminated you won't do it. You certainly won't do it all the time just on spec. We did it to them and now we won't fix it. But we build a multibillion dollar embassy for ourselves.
reveres,
It appears that the Baghdad embassy will only cost about a billion dollars.
Melanie: That was an interesting article, thanks for the link. The date on it was April 14, 2006 though.
Is there anything more recent???
Further information is that it will be able to withstand a Kenya type of blast at the gates and still stand. There are to be a lot of defensive points and no one is going to drive up with a car bomb and be able to get thru the gate. The buildings are supposed to be able to withstand a 1000 pounder or an airliner crashing into it.
Bout a billion sounds right to me to build a city within a city.
Randy, You've just pinned down the psychology of colonial occupation: "...to build a city within a city"! I was born in Eire back in '68 and feel culturally angered the British hierarchy of a few centuries ago, in pursuit of Brit empire building "stuff", freely allowed many Irish men, women and children to die painfully... This nazi-esque shit created Oz, Canada, and America. So, here we are in 2007!
And if you are stuck in that city with in a city, you are STUCK. You have lost the war, literally and figuratively. Your enemy can move about at will and starve you out. No cargo coming in from ground or air would be allowed.
Gindy-With all due respect even during the fall of Saigon US forces created a corridor by which thousands of people escaped. Unless there was a dust storm of biblical proportions and even the insurgents dont move during those we could do the same. The facility is going to have four helipads large enough to accomodate V-22's and CH-47's and 46's. Its also very, very close to the airport. Unless they used something such as a chemical weapon munition and lobbed it into the grounds they likely wouldnt be able to do much. Remember, its US territory and the host nation is responsible for security but this particular territory is likely to be the second most defensive position in the world. They could keep rail fired cruise missiles on the grounds and absolutely devastate everything within 50 miles on their schedule, as needed. Not to mention what the Navy and Air Force would do to protect them if it came down to it.
Manned by Marines there has only been one instance where a embassy was over run and that was only when they were told to stand down on direct Presidential order. Perhaps you remember him.... Jimmy Carter. It is an act of war to attack an embassy and we should have done them then. Carter decided to let the Shah into the US for cancer treatment.... good. He chose not to defend our territory...bad.
Kind of like what I fault GWB right now for.... not defending our borders and if we get hit with a traceable back thru Mexico he is going to be on my asshole list like Carter is. He is already on Reveres and others. See, we can agree to agree.
21 buildings on 104 acres
5,500 Americans and Iraqis working at the embassy, almost half listed as security
six times larger than the United Nations compound in New York
its own water wells, electricity plant and wastewater-treatment facility
yeah. this endeavor was totally about idealistic humanism. not about occupation, colonialism, or overt rule of a sovereign nation. not at all. we're there for the iraqis. and that's why we're going to completely separate ourselves from them.
Sapo-With all due respect as well the UN has a perimeter police force and there are always cops from NYC around it. And if you havent been up on current events, we had every embassy or nearly blown up in Africa just a few years ago and all on the same day. Massive casualties of local population. The Russians and French are planning large embassies as well.
Its an embassy. Not McDonalds.
WHO confirms 1st cholera case in Baghdad
Mikey-What you werent aware that there is cholera in Baghdad. As for the "how it happened" we arent holding the shipment up, the Iraqi's are.
FYI as I understand it from feet on the floor in Baghdad, the last couple of loads were simply spirited away as they were a heavy oxidizer used in bomb making. A very simple answer is the use of chlorine liquid instead of the powder but they dont quite have the equipment for introduction in a metered form.
But the Iraqi's are responsible for their water works and apparently there are plenty of wells to draw from then sanitize and send it out but they are fighting over who is going to be in charge. The US is now in a mode of security and assistance where they are able and requested. They were specifically excluded from the water process.
Another story with an insinuation that we are responsible for that particular problem. The woman could have also gotten cholera from food too.
How can the U.S. government generated epidemic not be viewed as comparable to the liquidation of the Warsaw ghetto? Note today's AP story http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070921/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_cholera_5;_ylt=…
indicating that the U.S. is blocking tons of chlorine from entering Iraq.
The U.S. claims that chlorine can be used as a weapon but ignores the fact that its use was quickly abandoned by all sides during WWI simply because chlorine is not an effective weapon. On the other hand cholera is incredibly deadly, particularly since the U.S. government, like the Germans army which imposed then liquidated the Warsaw ghetto, blocks potable water and medicines such as packets of 27 cents worth of electrolites from reaching civilians. This combination would permit people to survive cholera throughout Iraq.
I solicit help in demonstrating the coherence (validity) of the metaphor: Iraq is America's Warsaw Ghetto.
As in the case of the Warsaw ghetto, the prime means of mass murder was denial of food and medicine. The use of standard military were secondary secibdart in both attrocities.
I fear we may be seeing the first steps of the liquidation of Iraq. For us to refuse to investigate and protest is to be as complicit as our academic counterparts in Germany during the liquication of the Warsaw ghetto.
Tom500K-It doesnt say the Americans are holding up the shipments, its the Iraqi's. They also have had cholera for years and long before we got there. Iraqification of the infrastructure. They have as I understand it not requested US help in transportation of the chlorine.
Also, the water systems were not safe before we got there. If the Iraqi's make the request the chlorine could be in every town in under four hours by air.
Randy: I guess we haven't had any effect, then. They had cholera before, they have it again. They had bad water before. They have it again. They had a stable society before, they . . . oh, wait.
Let me finish it for you......"they will have a stable society again" Minus 473,000 dead from torture and wholesale murder by Saddam and his buddies. I hear Chemical Ali is going to get the noose soon too. They may commute his sentence if he speaks up as to where all the VX and Tabun went..
Now thats stability for you. You know things are getting civilized if they are allowed to cop a plea. Westernization and PC'd.
Randy: As opposed to the 600,000 plus we have killed so far? And you think this will stabilize? Please call me. I have a 12 year old Volvo looking for a nice home. Runs great.
How about this?....... Insurgents are taking a dump upstream.
People contract cholera by ingesting water or food contaminated with the feces of an infected person.
Cholera is not uncommon in Iraq, which typically reports around 30 cases a year, public health experts say, with the last major outbreak coming in 1999. While it can be stopped with warnings and basic precautions like boiling water, it has crept south through the tumultuous Diyala region, which has been convulsed in sectarian conflict.
Reporting was contributed by Ahmad Fadam, Sahar Najeeb, Ali Fahim, Mudhafar Fadhil and other Iraqi employees of The New York Times.
Lea: We should be so lucky that insurgents have cholera. That was silly. Regarding how "uncommon" cholera is in Iraq, it's incidence is 1 per million. In my book that's uncommon, maybe not in yours. You can die from Cholera in hours. It is a disease of bad water, almost entirely. $400 million a day we pour in there and we can't provide the community with safe water? Isn't that a form of security?
Revere-We havent killed 600,000 in Iraq. If we had there would have been a funeral every minute. It just hasnt happened. If you want to say that there have been a lot of violent deaths as the Lancet study indicated which is by no way complete or totally scientific I will agree with you. NOR will I agree that we did them. Right now two very left wing groups put Iraqi fatalities caused by US and coalition forces at about 79,000 since '03. I can account for by DoD information from the beginning to end of hostilities (active Iraqi army surrender) 55,000. But even some of that is in question. Afterwards there have been the remaining number and that is reported by the DoD.
Indeed the highest number of people are killed by gunfire and not by the Coalition forces. The second highest number? IED's and roadside bombs.
The Lancet report you are probably citing is being used as an agenda rather than an actuality Revere. If we had outright killed 600,000 of the opposition, the war would be over and we would have been home by now.
There were 7.5 million German deaths between civilian and military personnel in WWII. We also kill on a 6 to 1 ratio on the ground now Revere so IMO your numbers just dont add up.
The numbers that the Lancet are citing are skewed as well. Indeed, the numbers you cite since the begining of hostilities would come out to 410 people a day are getting killed and that includes the 55,000 military. You can send me to any site you want but we couldnt get 400 a day in Vietnam, much less 410 a day in Iraq.
The average life expectancy is 69 years. Pretty good if you ask me.
I say again brother, where are the bodies?
Randy: What would you say if 300,000 Iraqis died in a year? A funeral every minute? Because that's a 1% death rate, which is a normal death rate. So 600,000 over three years is 200,000 a year over background. That's a lot, almost double, but hardly a funeral a minute. Do you have an informed scientific critique of the Lancet article? Or are you just ranting? BTW, the study has withstood all assaults by uninformed critics. The statistical consultant from Hopkins is a member of the National Academy (and someone I know). I've read the study. So if you want to discuss its scientific merits I'm ready. Remember Russia lost 4 million a year, twenty times that number. But maybe that didn't happen either.
Revere your assertion was that we were killing them, that was my rub with it. If there were 300,000 a year and we had done it then as I said the war would be over. Sectarian violence is the main culprit and we do have ur numbers too for our own being killed which is about 3800. If it were 200,000 a year Revere thats STILL 500 and change a day and I still say thats bogus. So IMO someone is using that fuzzy math thing again. I also will again say that if we were doing it then we would have the body count to show for it. We dont. Indeed it will take our normal 6 to 1 ratio and push it out to about 20 to 1 or beyond without doing any really hard thinking about it.
Its not a rant either. This is more of the propaganda that keeps getting shoveled out and many just accept. They still enjoy a high life expectancy on the average in Iraq, their numbers and not mine. The Lancet report states from the beginning that it is trying to reconcile numbers but only brushes on a simple fact... they dont know for sure. I so far havent seen anything out of the lefty media about the "killing fields" which is what they would have if we were whacking 200,000 a year. Shit, we couldnt get anything close to that in Vietnam.
I would have liked to because it would have meant like Iraq that we were having a tremendous effect on them. Simple attrition would have done it if that were the facts.
I will read anything else you have on the subject if you want to send it along. I never say anyone is wrong here Revere but if its something factual I would like to read it. I still think you are a great American for sticking to your ideals.
Perhaps silly to you revere however, not out of the realm of possibilities for me.
Not really sure how to answer this as $400 million a day we pour in there and we can't provide the community with safe water? Isn't that a form of security?
Other than, when one is being shot at or betrayed day in and day out by insurgents and even citizens of the country, it's most likely difficult to really do the simple, basic, necessary things that make everyday living livable.
And then it boils down to personal responsibility.
Why is it the world appears to have a "welfare" state of consciousness?
Randy: Perhaps you better read the papers and then we could have a basis for a discussion about what they say. Among epidemiologists and disaster experts the Lancet articles are considered the best information we have. That doesn't make them accurate. It just means that those are, so far, the most reliable data we have. Of course, according to the US Military, "we don't do body counts," so other data is scant. The 600,000 are excess deaths in the time period after the invasion compared to before. Thus they are a measure of the extra number of people dying as a result of the invasion. As for how many people can be killed, the answer is a whole lot. Think of what happened in a short period in the Somme, Verdun, etc.
Lea: The whole point of water treatment is that if there are human fecal materials going in to the raw water the treatment eliminates them. So even in the outlandish instance of a cholera ridden insurgent deliberately crapping his life out upstream it wouldn't make any difference in an intact water system. Regarding your portrayal of life and the priorities in Iraq, I agree with you completely. Maybe it is time for the US to take some responsibility for its actions in Iraq. Or is that just applicable to benighted Iraqis?
Ah now wait here Revere, your insinuation is that WE caused those 600K overage. Uh-uh aint hanging that one on our necks. If we had done it we literally would have been gone, out, finished. The war would have ended in a day, much less than 3 years. The Lancets report is in reference to excess deaths. According to whom? They cant state for the record that in a war zone as its designated by just about everyone and Lloyds of London, that there is any that could be called an "excess death." Lets just call it a war and keep on chuggin' because GWB isnt going to leave and now success becomes imperitive. It is time to reassert the control thats needed. If you recall L. of Arabia took Damascus and was immediately hammered in the Brit press because the wounded were not being cared for and that even back then meant water, food, electricity.
Even at the height of Tet there were supposedly only 200,000 insurgents/VietCong and NVA in country. There were indeed some 500,000 and that came from Diep himself and we smacked them down in under a month. But as to the water situation, its bad. It was bad before we got there, it will be bad afterwards. Its not our job any longer according to the Iraqi's to provide water or electricity. They have taken those jobs over.
They also are attacking the facilities and unhooking them from the grid and somehow thats our fault? Nope, by Iraqi decree it is NOT under our control. We are there to only keep the peace and not run the country. You want us out then fine, just as soon as they can stand on their own. Electrical production is at its lowest now because once they unhook from the grid, the ministry of electricity stops sending them fuel. Then the grid shuts down. Baghdad has electricity in most areas, most of the time.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/23/world/middleeast/23electricity.html?e…
Generally speaking, you cant pump water if there is no electricity (hello Bird Flu calling) and thats one of the problems. Their grid is even older than ours and totalling it up they need about 1 million kilowatts to bring the system up. But you cant make fuel without electricity so its all a catch 22. There are turbines sitting idle while they wait for excess wasted natural gas to arrive to fuel them, but it hasnt. But its an Iraqi problem and they had the same problems in Korea when we went in there as well.
The fastest way to return Baghdad to normalcy is to restore control over these facilities and hook them up, keep them running and kill the person whose wires lead to illegal hookups. How the Iraqi's do that is something they will have to figure out. Before they were controlled by the Republican Guard. Anyone want them back?
Oh dear. Never would it be assumed that Iraqis are benighted revere. Good god, be wise enough to extend some leeway here as you cannot possibly know for even one moment what truly lies within my heart.
You presume, because I am in favor of our military, that I agree with killing or being killed. I do not.
You have studied in the academic lifestyle apparently for the greatest portion of your lifetime. This puts both of us at a disadvantage in earnestly and honestly attempting to communicate viewpoints of difference to each other. But I try, and with the superior academic mindset it quite possibly amuses you. (No ill intent either from that comment, just straightforward honesty through observation).
Maybe it is time for the US to take some responsibility for its actions in Iraq.
No: It's time for the Iraqi's to take charge of their future in our now undeniable global world through education and self-interest of the individual.
Yes: The US will pay a dear price for anything it's done that is immoral, not good, bad, and on and on revere.
But how can you say such a thing when all we get are unreliable half-truths? From both political parties.
Lea: Of course I am not trying to say I know what is in your heart.I can only know what you write here. And blamed the victim in Iraq, some poor slob that contracted cholera, because, in your view, they didn't take enough care. That's the basis for me saying you thought they were benighted and I think it's a fair characteization of what you wrote. I can't know what you thought. We could help them take responsibility of their lives if we would get out of their lives.
Randy: I am using the US legal definition of causation (since you like laws so much): But for the invasion those people wouldn't have died (which is the meaning of excess deaths).
Wars traveling companion just got a new boost. The IDF seized parts of that nuclear cache just ahead of the attack last month on the nuke facilities. The green light was given afterwards by the US for Israel to attack and bomb the place. So the Norkos/Iranians and Syrians are all out there actively setting up to lauch WMD's that they werent supposed to have. I guess the question regardng the location of the stuff isnt in question any longer.
Randy: Evidence? Or Fox News.
I hate to bring this up because it will be controversial. I have said it before and I will say it again, studies lean to the direction of who funded it. This includes Henry Waxmans never ending reports and the outcome of what a political study being done will say. They are politically slanted and any Congressional, GAO or whatever study should be assessed automatically as such. The whole process stinks.
When there is a mistake, an insinuation we leave it up to objective media to get the story out, to take it apart and dissect the pieces to get at the root of the smell. This has been IMO categorically subverted by influences on the media and I am not talking the right or the left because both are responsible for it. Objectivity is the only thing we should have in the media, now we get this below.
Recently, I called into question the veracity of the Lancet study of "excess deaths" in Iraq the MINUTE that Revere posted it and I even went as far as to buy the pub...one time out adventure. Expensive. The more I read the more I knew that this was a snow job and a fabrication of fact. The information about 600,000 killed was indeed flawed back then and most of us just accepted it. I didnt and I still dont. They left themselves an out of course in the conclusions.
The original post date above was 9/17/07 and in that above I contended then that there couldnt have possibly been that many casualties in Iraq because there werent any graves, there were no bodies. Remember the issues in Vietnam about inflated body counts? Those royally pissed me off. It was those inflated body counts that actually led to the Tet offensive. They knew how many people in N. Vietnam were in the military and how many Viet Cong there were. There was an assessment of how many they had killed. In fact they were about 500,000 short and they all showed up for the party on New Years in the form of the Tet Offensive.
Around the date above to just before this was also the time that Barack Obama made statements that the US was attacking by strafing fire and bombing-civilian targets. Petraeus was being called a liar by Hillary Clinton in the Senate, and it was a line picked up by the New York Times. It was debunked and called a myth then, it still is now. But the assertion was that we were strafing civilians. That is what stuck in the minds of people. The 600,000 number was also reported in mainstream media.... It was immediately denied by the DoD.
Now the fastest way to piss a military guy off is to impugn their honor. That would be that some politically motivated type of the vein of Barack and Hillary would make those statements. We in the military were and are required to provide the utmost respect to Senators and Congressmen. But in light of current events, I cant see why. We sure as Hell never get it from them.
Yes we could attack and strafe civilians anytime we want. In fact I advocated this whenever a bad guy ran into a semi-civilian area and we know that they are harboring him. Small 50 pounders would be used in this instance and specific targets, and only on orders. Collaterals are always a product of war, get used to it. Better to hit a few on the front than a whole army on the back.
There has for a long while been a disinformation campaign going on about this war and its to a political agenda. That simply was that there had to be a seizure of power. The Democrats successfully took the Congress as part of this campaign of obscuring the facts, demonizing the good news and really outright lies. Any good information about the Iraqification of the war was immediately seized upon as a bad thing and turned. But if you cant obscure the facts you have to skew the message. That means you control the media.
Fact is that Saddam gave aid and comfort to the enemy as evidenced by the training camps in the country. Fact is that Mohammed Atta was released by the Israelis from prison at the behest of the then President William Jefferson Clinton and he later bombed the World Trade Centers. Fact is that the first attack on the US at the WTC's occurred on his watch and he did nothing. Fact is that our embassies were attacked and leveled in Africa in 1998, he did nothing. Fact is that we could have taken Bin Laden in the late nineties. Indeed we were offered him up. We could have just picked him up, but Clinton let him go. Anyone knowing what we know now likely would have waterboarded him to the point of death. I would have loved to have caused him some psychological damage....permanent please?
Now we come to this "excess death" thing that was part of a Lancet study that set me off. It has come to light that G. Soros, 77, atheist and billionaire who has funded the operations of MoveOn.org also funded the Lancet study. He did it thru MIT. This calls into question the objectivity of the Lancet and the media in general who should have been taking the study apart and determining who and what started this process. The Lancet is now going to have to go thru an internal peer review process and like everything in the newspapers, you wont be able to believe them any longer. The editors too should have questioned it. Where in the eff did the study originate? Did a couple of political operatives go to the hot bed of leftist ideals and say that they would fund the study? If it was paid for with taxpayer money then there is going to be Hell to pay for someone. The truth is that G. Soros paid for about 1/2 of it. This is from a guy who was hit for insider trading that made him a billionaire. His positions on Bush are well known. His position on the little people are much better known.
Soros has funded a lot of questionable activities but the people are being led by the media to a slaughter of a sort. Rush Limbaugh, CBS, NBC, the New York Times are all gaining audiences and they are biased by the direction they are taking. MoveOn.org's leaders recently said that they had taken over the Democrat Party. The quote? "We bought it, its ours" and thats a direct statement.
So who funds MoveOn.org. Soros in particular along with organizations he sub-funds and then they turn around and pay MoveOn.org. So is Soros in control of the Democrat Party? You be the judge. I wouldnt want to do anything like put crap into the papers or onto the TV, or into the Lancet. MIT also has to be called into question for the timing of the study. Why was the study even undertaken? We have government people and the UN to do that. What were the processes that went into the start of this? Likely an upcoming election is what in 06. That way they could cite the study as yet additional proof that we were failing in Iraq. That boosted Obama and Clintons bid and it also put the notion into the minds of the people that change needed to occur. Why? Because we were failing.
"Excess death in a war zone", was my statement. WTF does that mean? You have politically correct wars? No, you have dead people. You assert your will over others and the control structure associated with it. That is the purpose of war. If you are lucky you dont have a big war and you dont have a lot of them.
I called into question back then that proportionally there were more deaths in Iraq than in all of WWII against the Germans and they had everyone on their asses trying to kill as many as they could. Seems the Lancet has a bit to do about "objectivity" and MIT wont be on my donations list this year because I think now they are actively involved in distributing crap information and are now political operatives. A state and federally funded entity is now a political hack.
In fact I think they are fabricating stories to meet their goals. True? It would seem so. I wonder who's side they are on? If a bad news story comes out from now on I think we should all dissect it as media is also duped by what is purported as fact. This is where we are now. So start by reading more than the front page and think beyond what a newscaster says.
But until then, I suggest you read the below. Barack "Obombme" and Hillary Clinton owe the military an apology. Hillary in particular owes General Petraeus a personal apology. She called him a liar directly as a US Senator.
600,000 dead....Pure crap then, it certainly is now.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,322417,00.html
Randy: For someone who says "follow the money" you link to quite a bit of Rupert Murdoch Fox News sources. Maybe you Know Murdoch and feel he is a competent, credible communication channel. If you do, you will be one of the few. For my part, I know Les Roberts (author of the Lancet study) and I know his statistical consultant (a member of the National Academy), I know the methods used in the Lancet study and I have confidence it represented the best available information available at the time. I think mine is an informed opinion. If you want to argue methods and statistics, please feel free. Or visit Tim Lambert at Deltoid in Scienceblogs as he covers this in detail. But don't call good scientists liars and cheats for doing the best science under very difficult conditions.
The simple fact is you think Iraq was a great idea and you won't acknowledge any information that says it isn't. You cherry pick links and sources (usually highly biased ones) and consider that an argument. It isn't. Neither you or I are paid but that doesn't make our views right -- or wrong. You want Clinton to apologize to a public figure but you have no compunction about calling reputable scientists liars. Maybe an apology from you is in order, although I doubt Les Roberts cares. The political right wing has been lying about him for years just because of that study.
Iraq is a failure and will hurt this country. Everyone who supported it -- including Clinton and you and Powell and twenty some Democratic Senators (but NOT 22 other Dems who voied against war authorization in 2002). Make no mistake -- you are all in the same boat there, responsible for hurting this country in a grievous and probably irreparable way. You won't take responsibility or acknowledge the error. You are blind to it. But the rest of the world and a huge proportion of the American public isn't.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article3177653.ece
First posting of it Revere this morning in London. Not Fox and Murdoch. Personally, I didnt believe what I was reading because I truly thought that no one could be that stupid to do something like this and expect to get away with it. MIT might not be taking in the brightest bulbs in the socket anymore. Politically naive for sure. .
Maybe we need a few more Foxnews types to really start digging. Sooner or later a threshold will be crossed if and when they do and the indictments will start running. Maybe federal or state money was used to produce the study? There's that threshold. Let them find out that there was and they'll be into every school in America. Anyone standing in the way of that will find themselves with an obstruction charge. I dont recommend it.
I dont cherry pick too terribly much. Its just whats out there. It was quick and you are diverting from the story. The story is that your pal didnt disclose and I sure as heck would like to know when the funding started, who and what were involved. Lancet has a crapload of explaining to do after that shotgunning you gave them back a few months ago in adulation of this story...As for your friend, he should really just come clean and say something more that it was just an error in judgement. I said the same of a friend that is a politician who got caught with his hands in the cookie jar recently. Good friend. He fucked up. I will visit him in prison where he will reside for the next six years. Is there anything else these guys want to let us know before the pooh-pooh hits the rotary grinder?
Unbiased study... liars maybe. Thats relative. They surely knew where the funding came from. But was their intent political or was it to truly pull up results? Its sure in question now Revere. The spin meisters on both sides are in on it now and this dog is about to hunt.
As for hurting this country.... Thats an opinion. Vote for Obombme or Edwards if you feel so strongly. Be sure to put Kerry the Ear Cutter in there too. Likely will be Obombme's # 2 guy, payoff for the endorsement.
If it later comes out there were WMD's beyond the UN verified ones then there is going to be a lot of finger pointing and I told you so. But it wont change anything. We are the US government. WE ARE. That means that knocking that fat assed prick out of power in Iraq was a good thing, any day of the week. It also means that impeaching Clinton was a good thing. It means that by getting a resolution there was a majority of opinion. Snow job? We likely will never know.
As far as I am concerned this doesnt and hasnt hurt our country. It helps it. It puts a face on the deaths of soldiers and makes those idiots we call Congressmen and Senators take note. As for your reference to the "error" well that same Congress that voted for it and got a Democrat majority still thinks you are wrong. We could have not fought WWII as well, but as you know both of our genetic heritages... We wouldnt have made it.
I put this out there this afternoon to let everyone know that this is something that needs to be looked at and hard. I dont like being led down the primrose path. Certainly not by a billionaire from another country just because someone thinks that what we are doing is wrong and that by creating information to mold a story to the agenda is wrong. I sure as Hell dont want some publication that is supposed be elitist and objective with the ear of millions to make statements it is unable to back up. They likely were had too. Add in the some 200 million to all of the Soros political operatives in the last five years and only someone with a bias can sit back and pontificate.
http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewSpecialReports.asp?Page=%5CSpecialReports%5C…
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=275526219598836
Randy: You don't get it. My funding comes from George Bush (since it is gov't funding). I try to do the best science I can. If you have science critiques make them. The "Soros funded it" argument is silly and of no weight. How exactly did that affect the outcome? If you think it's all based on who funded it, why do you believe anything that comes from the Bush administration? Anything at all? It is just plain silly and not a valid form of argument. You and everyone who supported this war have set the US on the road to second class status, which may not be bad for the rest of the world but clearly isn't good from your point of view. Deal with it.