ThinkFast: April 10, 2006
ThinkFast: April 10, 2006
500,000 people marched through Dallas, joining thousands of others in cities across the U.S. yesterday, to rally against a House measure that renders unauthorized migrants criminals and ineligible for any immigration status. As part of a national “Day of Action for Immigrant Justice”, approximately 2 million people from 100 cities are expected to participate in rallies nationwide today.
38 percent. Bush’s “career low” job approval rating, according to the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll.
Lt. General Greg Newbold, a former director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, writes in Time: “I made no secret of my view that the zealots’ rationale for war made no sense. … But I now regret that I did not more openly challenge those who were determined to invade a country whose actions were peripheral to the real threat–al-Qaeda.†Newbold also became the third senior officer to call for Rumsfeld’s resignation.
The Army is facing a major officer shortage, expecting to fall short 2,500 captains and majors this year. “We’re ruining an Army that took us 30 years to build,” said Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE).
The Pentagon’s latest propaganda campaign revealed: playing up the role of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. “Our own focus on Zarqawi has enlarged his caricature, if you will — made him more important than he really is, in some ways,” Col. Derek Harvey, one of the top officers handling Iraq intelligence issues, told an Army meeting last summer.
The 17-year-old Christian Coalition is now is “more than $2 million in debt, beset by creditors’ lawsuits and struggling to hold on to some of its state chapters.†Meanwhile, close ties to Abramoff continue to dog the group’s former leader, Ralph Reed.
Four years after the federal investigation into Jack Abramoff’s Guam involvement began, the probe still leaves many questions unanswered. “Part of the reason the federal investigation into the Guam-Abramoff connection appears slow…is the possible discomfort in the Justice Department concerning the Guam investigation because of the possibility of insider involvement.”
Joining with Kurdish leaders, Iraq’s biggest Sunni Arab bloc has made a final decision to reject Ibrahim al-Jaafari as prime minister.
“Freedom Agenda” update: “Analysts and officials say the political rise of Islamists, the chaos in Iraq, the newfound Shiite power in Iraq with its implication for growing Iranian influence, and the sense among some rulers that they can wait out the end of the Bush administration have put the brakes on democratization” in the Arab world.
Katrina voting begins: “Hundreds of Hurricane Katrina evacuees from as far away as Texas and Georgia have signed up to board buses and return to Louisiana in order to vote on the future of New Orleans.â€
And finally, R&B singer Ernie K-Doe launches his bid to unseat Ray Nagin as Mayor of New Orleans. Ernie’s biggest challenge: he’s been dead for five years.
What did we miss? Let us know in the comments section.
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The march yesterday was spectacular. Being a Dallasite, it’s refrshing to see that many people cmoing together for an event other than a football game or stock car race.
April 10th, 2006 at 9:09 amI hate to be the fly in the ointment here, but wasn’t Bush’s last record low 37%?
April 10th, 2006 at 9:10 amIt’s a beautiful day to join a rally if you have the opportunity…
http://katrinamemo.blogspot.com/2006/04/millions-expected-to-march-against.html
April 10th, 2006 at 9:11 amNew Best Places/ Worst Places to Live- Surprise, surprise, Baghdad is the worst place to live. http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060410/od_nm/life_cities_dc;_ylt=As34pFLVSj0877_vjKuaZGgZ.3QA;_ylu=X3oDMTA3NW1oMDRpBHNlYwM3NTc-
April 10th, 2006 at 9:12 amSo, now we know how to “break the military”:
Let the GOP control the House, Senate, White House, and the Juduciary.
I can’t wait until the mid-term elections! I want to hear how the trolls “spin” the news when the GOP loses seats. They may not lose the Majority, but they will lose seats! There’s a much better chance the Senate will change to Democrat Majority!
Yes, the GOP WILL lose seats! No party stays in power forever, and the GOP has proven they are massive failures when it comes to their particular brand of partisan politics and “quid pro quo”.
April 10th, 2006 at 9:12 amIf i carry a weapon into an airport, if I don’t pay my federal income taxes, if I ship drugs via the US Postal service is that “Unauthorized”?
April 10th, 2006 at 9:14 am#2 – It all depends on which site/company is doing the “polling”.
ABC News/Washington Post poll listed the 38% approval as the “career low” for Pres. Bush.
April 10th, 2006 at 9:15 amHere’s my post that looks at reaction in the Iranian press to the news about the possible U.S. attack on Iran.
April 10th, 2006 at 9:17 amAddendum to previous post:
April 10th, 2006 at 9:23 amThe link to the Iran press reaction story on my web site is this.
Polls mean very little at this point. The question in November will be who do you trust to better protect America from terrorists? IT won’t be the party who wants to make it more difficult to wiretap terrorists and “kill the Patriot Act.”
The MSM is doing liberals a disservice. You should wait til after the election before you celebrate the Dems victory. If the GOP stays in power, the Democrats agenda of hate is finished. Good for the country, bad for liberal hatemongers.
April 10th, 2006 at 9:40 amJust in case any one thinks I might be hatefull regarding the immigration debate I can only stress that above all other rights as a citizen I cherish the right to vote more than any other. Large demonstrations are great to help sway public opinion but to me it seems futile. Imagine the impowerment these unauthorized vistors would feel by being able to democratically change their lifes. We all take risks and if they come here to join their authorized family members to share prosperity isn’t it up to the authorized to convince the rest of us that we need reform in our application to citizenry, not just to focus on allievating penalties on the exploited? Welcome to the country, now here is your SS # give us your address and let us all start paying our share. Federal taxes on gasoline and retail tax from walmart is not enough. We might even get tax reform along with more people we can count on as Americans when we need them.Let the voting begin.
April 10th, 2006 at 9:47 amTHAT ZARQAWI ITEM IS INTERESTING.
FOX NEWS ALWAYS HAS THAT GUY’S PICTURE PLASTERED ON THEIR SCREEN. ARE THEY BEING PLAYED, OR ARE THEY A PROPAGANDA ARM OF THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION?
WELL, I GUESS WE ALL KNOW THE ANSWER TO THAT……BUT IT’S GOOD TO HAVE IT EXPOSED.
April 10th, 2006 at 9:50 am[...] Because it’s not just the far left of the democratic base that is calling out Bush on his pre-war deceptions: Lt. General Greg Newbold, a former director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, writes in Time: “I made no secret of my view that the zealots’ rationale for war made no sense. … But I now regret that I did not more openly challenge those who were determined to invade a country whose actions were peripheral to the real threat–al-Qaeda.†Newbold also became the third senior officer to call for Rumsfeld’s resignation. [...]
April 10th, 2006 at 9:56 amUnemployment Rate – 4.7%
http://www.debbieschlussel.com/
Scroll down to where she starts talking about Jill Carrol, or immigrants, or just about anything really, even the new colours for the Chrysler Dodge.
Then come back and talk about hate mongering you son of a bitch.
April 10th, 2006 at 9:59 am#10: Will it be the party that violates the Constitution to wiretap American citizens? Will it be the party that has made the U.S. more vulnerable to terrorists by making Iraq a training ground and making the U.S. more hated throughout the Muslim world? Or, will it be the party that received 5 “F”s and 12 “D”s from the three-year study of security done by the 9/11 commission?
April 10th, 2006 at 10:23 am#14 – The GOP has always been the party of “hate”. They gained ascendancy after preaching “hate” for Pres. Clinton.
They are now finding out that continuing to beat the “hate everyone” drum is starting to turn the American citizen away from their extremist agenda, and will being a new political landscape by providing the silent GOP moderates a voice to bash the neo-con leaders over the head.
Now that the GOP has proven they are the party of Fiscal Irresponsibility, that they hate our returning veterans by closing VA hospital after VA hospital, refusing to properly armor our soldiers and their vehicles, and have created the largest federal government ever, they will begin to turn on themselves.
I look forward to them losing seats this coming November. History has proven that no single political party remains on power forever. Ignore history at your peril!
April 10th, 2006 at 10:27 am(OT-pardon me)
Unemployment Rate – 4.7%,
A little something related to your “handle” namesake. (This was originally posted by John Knopp- don’t think he’ll mind a repeat though).
Read it all- then tell us how good the economy is under your “Furorâ€.
Nuking the Economy
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
Last week the Bureau of Labor Statistics re-benchmarked the payroll jobs data back to 2000. Thanks to Charles McMillion of MBG Information Services, I have the adjusted data from January 2001 through January 2006. If you are worried about terrorists, you don’t know what worry is.
Job growth over the last five years is the weakest on record. The US economy came up more than 7 million jobs short of keeping up with population growth. That’s one good reason for controlling immigration. An economy that cannot keep up with population growth should not be boosting population with heavy rates of legal and illegal immigration.
Over the past five years the US economy experienced a net job loss in goods producing activities. The entire job growth was in service-providing activities–primarily credit intermediation, health care and social assistance, waiters, waitresses and bartenders, and state and local government.
US manufacturing lost 2.9 million jobs, almost 17% of the manufacturing work force. The wipeout is across the board. Not a single manufacturing payroll classification created a single new job.
The declines in some manufacturing sectors have more in common with a country undergoing saturation bombing during war than with a super-economy that is “the envy of the world.†Communications equipment lost 43% of its workforce. Semiconductors and electronic components lost 37% of its workforce. The workforce in computers and electronic products declined 30%. Electrical equipment and appliances lost 25% of its employees. The workforce in motor vehicles and parts declined 12%. Furniture and related products lost 17% of its jobs. Apparel manufacturers lost almost half of the work force. Employment in textile mills declined 43%. Paper and paper products lost one-fifth of its jobs. The work force in plastics and rubber products declined by 15%. Even manufacturers of beverages and tobacco products experienced a 7% shrinkage in jobs.
The knowledge jobs that were supposed to take the place of lost manufacturing jobs in the globalized “new economy†never appeared. The information sector lost 17% of its jobs, with the telecommunications work force declining by 25%. Even wholesale and retail trade lost jobs. Despite massive new accounting burdens imposed by Sarbanes-Oxley, accounting and bookkeeping employment shrank by 4%. Computer systems design and related lost 9% of its jobs. Today there are 209,000 fewer managerial and supervisory jobs than 5 years ago.
In five years the US economy only created 70,000 jobs in architecture and engineering, many of which are clerical. Little wonder engineering enrollments are shrinking. There are no jobs for graduates. The talk about engineering shortages is absolute ignorance. There are several hundred thousand American engineers who are unemployed and have been for years. No student wants a degree that is nothing but a ticket to a soup line. Many engineers have written to me that they cannot even get Wal-Mart jobs because their education makes them over-qualified.
Offshore outsourcing and offshore production have left the US awash with unemployment among the highly educated. The low measured rate of unemployment does not include discouraged workers. Labor arbitrage has made the unemployment rate less and less a meaningful indicator. In the past unemployment resulted mainly from turnover in the labor force and recession. Recoveries pulled people back into jobs.
Unemployment benefits were intended to help people over the down time in the cycle when workers were laid off. Today the unemployment is permanent as entire occupations and industries are wiped out by labor arbitrage as corporations replace their American employees with foreign ones.
Economists who look beyond political press releases estimate the US unemployment rate to be between 7% and 8.5%. There are now hundreds of thousands of Americans who will never recover their investment in their university education.
Unless the BLS is falsifying the data or businesses are reporting the opposite of the facts, the US is experiencing a job depression. Most economists refuse to acknowledge the facts, because they endorsed globalization. It was a win-win situation, they said.
They were wrong.
At a time when America desperately needs the voices of educated people as a counterweight to the disinformation that emanates from the Bush administration and its supporters, economists have discredited themselves. This is especially true for “free market economists†who foolishly assumed that international labor arbitrage was an example of free trade that was benefitting Americans. Where is the benefit when employment in US export industries and import-competitive industries is shrinking? After decades of struggle to regain credibility, free market economics is on the verge of another wipeout.
No sane economist can possibly maintain that a deplorable record of merely 1,054,000 net new private sector jobs over five years is an indication of a healthy economy. The total number of private sector jobs created over the five year period is 500,000 jobs less than one year’s legal and illegal immigration! (In a December 2005 Center for Immigration Studies report based on the Census Bureau’s March 2005 Current Population Survey, Steven Camarota writes that there were 7,9 million new immigrants between January 2000 and March 2005.)
The economics profession has failed America. It touts a meaningless number while joblessness soars. Lazy journalists at the New York Times simply rewrite the Bush administration’s press releases.
On February 10 the Commerce Department released a record US trade deficit in goods and services for 2005–$726 billion. The US deficit in Advanced Technology Products reached a new high. Offshore production for home markets and jobs outsourcing has made the US highly dependent on foreign provided goods and services, while simultaneously reducing the export capability of the US economy. It is possible that there might be no exchange rate at which the US can balance its trade.
Polls indicate that the Bush administration is succeeding in whipping up fear and hysteria about Iran. The secretary of defense is promising Americans decades-long war. Is death in battle Bush’s solution to the job depression? Will Asians finance a decades-long war for a bankrupt country?
Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review. He is co-author of The Tyranny of Good Intentions. He can be reached at: paulcraigroberts@yahoo.com
Comment by John Konop — April 6, 2006 @ 8:25 pm
April 10th, 2006 at 10:31 amDemocrat Soldier
You are forgetting something there. When a US soldier gets wounded, that soldier is charged for any damaged equipment. That is some kind of sick.
April 10th, 2006 at 10:31 amUP….4.7………Sorry, your figures don’t fly out here in the depressed world. First and formost the people that have exausted their benefits are not counted. Once the person has used up their benefits they become non existant.
Factor in the food bank increases and welfare applicants and the homeless and you will have a more correct figure. Also include in your figures the working poor who are working 2 and 3 jobs part time with no benefits and the elderly that have had to return to work and you will get a totaly diffrent figure. Figures do not add up. Join me and contribute some of your time to your local shelters and food banks and see the faces of our country. Their are warn out, confused and tired. We the people have been lied to, our country is being distroyed from with in and the Bush administration is at fault. None of this was going on during Clintons terms. I was out there then and I am out there now working for change. Get a clue…….Blessings
April 10th, 2006 at 10:35 amI’m confused at the claims that 37 or 38 percent is a new low. In previous months I have seen plenty of numbers ranging from 36 to 39 percent. If
April 10th, 2006 at 10:45 amdifferent polls give different numbers maybe you should say “the xyz poll shows a new low at zz%”
#5
What have the Democrats done that will make people want to vote FOR them?
April 10th, 2006 at 11:18 am#19
“None of this was going on during Clintons terms.”
LOL!
April 10th, 2006 at 11:21 am#20 – “Lowest ever” Polls are usually compared to polls done by the same company.
What they’re saying is that the ABC/Wash. Post poll was the “career low”.
April 10th, 2006 at 11:37 am#21 – Ok, answer me this:
What have the Republicans done that will make people want to vote FOR them?
April 10th, 2006 at 11:41 amI hope as many people march for Earth Day, April 22.
The Nobel Peace Prize winner, Wangari Maathai, of Kenya, proved that peace and the environment go hand in hand.
Wasn’t NAFTA suppose to make things better, here and in Mexico? So what happened to NAFTA?
April 10th, 2006 at 11:42 am#21 – They haven’t lied about reasons for going to war.
They haven’t created the most massive debt in the history of humankind.
They haven’t disenfranchised voters.
They haven’t passed “ethics” laws to keep the unethical in power.
They haven’t been responsible for the biggest failure in national security that allowed terrorists to kill almost 3 thousand citizens.
It’s not so much what they have done, it’s the things they HAVEN’T done. :-)
April 10th, 2006 at 11:42 am#25 – I wish the Democrats could organize as well as the immigration protesters.
April 10th, 2006 at 11:45 amAddition:
Both these comes from War and Piece:
1.
2.
Can you imagine nuclear weapons in the hands of this administration! Bush, whose base believes in Armageddon. The goal should not be a nuclear race but nuclear disarmament around the world.
April 10th, 2006 at 12:03 pm#24
Prevented any terrorist attacks on the U.S. in about 6 years. Unemployment is a function of the private sector and the ecomony so I won’t place much credit with the Republicans there although the tax cuts helped. There are many things that the Republicans haven’t done i.e. immigration reform, partially privitizing social security, ect…, however I am still searching for any NEW ideas or plans that the Democrats have proposed that would make anyone want to vote for them.
April 10th, 2006 at 12:12 pm#26
“They haven’t lied about reasons for going to war.”
Neither have the Republicans.
“They haven’t created the most massive debt in the history of humankind.”
Very true, but they most definately helped.
“They haven’t disenfranchised voters.”
BS! LOL!
“They haven’t passed “ethics†laws to keep the unethical in power.”
Yeah, but many Democrats voted for those BS laws.
“They haven’t been responsible for the biggest failure in national security that allowed terrorists to kill almost 3 thousand citizens.”
Clinton was a Democrat.
“It’s not so much what they have done, it’s the things they HAVEN’T done. :-)”
Clinton knows that all too well.
April 10th, 2006 at 12:25 pmThe march yesterday was spectacular. Being a Dallasite, it’s refrshing to see that many people cmoing together for an event other than a football game or stock car race.
Comment by Hardy Haberman —
You’ll think spectacular when they get tired of slave labor wages and come after your lilly white ass with a gun. Dumbass.
April 10th, 2006 at 12:26 pmCan you imagine nuclear weapons in the hands of this administration! Bush, whose base believes in Armageddon. The goal should not be a nuclear race but nuclear disarmament around the world.
Comment by Jack
You give up yours first loser.
April 10th, 2006 at 12:28 pm#28
“The goal should not be a nuclear race but nuclear disarmament around the world.”
If that were to happen, there would be a lot more wars.
April 10th, 2006 at 12:37 pmI don’t know if you didn’t notice Tracy, but Clinton wasn’t in power when it happened. Hadn’t been for some time if I remember correctly. Of course, actually remembering something that was, what, the biggest event in recent US history, might be beyond you.
You can’t blame Clinton for shit that happened after he left office, you can only blame him for shit that happened while he was in office. This is why I keep on saying, with a Democrat in power, the buck stops in the Oval office, with a Republican in power, the buck stops in the office of the nearest Democrat.
April 10th, 2006 at 1:22 pmTracy, IRI and the rest of the trolls — BYE BYE. You are the party of freaks, dumbasses and liars. America doesn’t like to be lied to and we certainly don’t like idiots.
April 10th, 2006 at 1:37 pm#36
“You can’t blame Clinton for shit that happened after he left office, you can only blame him for shit that happened while he was in office.”
That is a asinine statement. If you don’t think that Clinton bears a huge responsibility for 9/11 happening considering it was planned on his watch then you are completely clueless. I can blame him directly for Al Qaeda getting immensely powerful and sophisticated during the 8 years he was in office and the multiple attacks that they carried out against the U.S. duing those years.
“This is why I keep on saying, with a Democrat in power, the buck stops in the Oval office, with a Republican in power, the buck stops in the office of the nearest Democrat.”
That’s very amusing considering the Republicans FORCED Clinton to sign the balance budget amendment in 1994.
April 10th, 2006 at 1:40 pm#36
“You are the party of freaks, dumbasses and liars.”
Then you better not support the Democrats anymore. An independent move away from the left would be a good start.
April 10th, 2006 at 1:44 pmReally?
Looks to me like Clinton did what he feasably could, save invading Afghanistan because it would slant the US elections, and provided every possible assistance and warning to GW about what Osama was about. Of course, as has been shown characteristic of your boy since that fateful day, GW decided not to listen.
April 10th, 2006 at 2:14 pm#39
“As chair of the interagency Counter-Terrorism Security Group (CSG), Clarke was known as a bit of an obsessive—just the sort of person you want in a job of that kind. Since the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in Yemen on Oct. 12, 2000—an attack that left 17 Americans dead—he had been working on an aggressive plan to take the fight to al-Qaeda.”
Taking the fight to al Qaeda? Are you kidding? What about all the other attacks prior to the USS Cole?
“With less than a month left in office, they did not think it appropriate to launch a major initiative against Osama bin Laden.”
Why not!? Clinton was supposedly commander-in-chief. The timing of the launch of the “war on terror” shouldn’t have mattered.
“We would be handing [the Bush Administration] a war when they took office on Jan. 20,” says a former senior Clinton aide. “That wasn’t going to happen.”
Oh, so he was more concerned about the “image” of the Clinton administration than national security. Well that explains why this entire “war of terror” did not start even after the first bombing of the WTC in 1993. Pathetic. This is the WHOLE point that make this article SOOO revealing about the impotent Clinton counter terrorism policies during the 1990s. Thanks for posting it. They didn’t do ANYTHING for eight years and then the slime editors at Time Magazine try and make it look like Clinton did all he could to fight al Qaeda during his time in office. Does that include the time when Clinton, on tape, said that he couldn’t legally detain bin Laden when the Sudanese government offered his capture to him?
“Other senior officials from both the Clinton and Bush administrations, however, say that Clarke had a set of proposals to “roll back” al-Qaeda.”
Roll back? That’s a great strategy!
“Could al-Qaeda’s plot have been foiled if the U.S. had taken the fight to the terrorists in January 2001? Perhaps not.”
AGAIN this fight should have been taken to al-Qaeda in 1993! Apparently Michael Elliott at Time is a complete Clinton cover boy.
More Clinton BS politics, from the article…
“If we had done anything, say, two weeks before the election,” says a former senior Clinton aide, “we’d be accused of helping Al Gore.”
Yes this article is very revealing about what Clinton DID NOT do for the eight years he was in office.
April 10th, 2006 at 3:12 pmOkay Tracy, say Clinton planned an attack on Afghanistan a month before the elections, and asked Congress for permission to do it. Remember, this is a Republican Congress you are talking about.
What would be the result of Congress calling it a means of helping Gore in the elections? Congress would go on to say no. It wasn’t going to happen.
That Bush then went on to ignore the information left by his predecessor in power, and continued to ignore any information pertaining to Al Qeaeda up until 9/11 of course, doesn’t seem to leave you in the least bit annoyed
April 10th, 2006 at 3:42 pmDid anyone notice in the Zarqawi story that it said some of the Propaganda was “seen on Fox News”
Fox news is BTV from V for Vendetta
April 10th, 2006 at 3:48 pm#41
You need to back up few YEARS in 1993 when the DEMOCRATS ruled Congress.
April 10th, 2006 at 4:00 pm43
And you need to come forward a few years to when the Republicans did. Clinton probably didn’t know where Osama was in ‘93, and you can’t exactly bomb places at random in the hopes of getting lucky and blowing up someone who may or may not be a threat 8 years down the line. In ‘93 did you know Osama even existed?
He knew where Osama was a month before his term ended, but it was too late by then. Then he left office, Bush took the reigns, and proceded to ignore the information Clinton left behind.
All of your screams of Clinton this and Clinton that do not change what Bush did, or didn’t do in the runnup to 9/11.
April 10th, 2006 at 4:14 pm#29 – Prevented any terrorist attacks on the U.S. in about 6 years.
Credit given — for sheer dumb luck. Seen Osama bin Laden lately?
April 10th, 2006 at 4:24 pm#44
“And you need to come forward a few years to when the Republicans did.”
What relevance does that have to that fact that Clinton was commander-in-chief who was charged with implementing U.S. counter terrorism policies for 8 years.
Main point: WHY didn’t this “war or terror” start right after the 1993 WTC bombing?
“In ‘93 did you know Osama even existed?”
No, after 1991.
“He knew where Osama was a month before his term ended, but it was too late by then”
IF (LOL!) Clinton knew exactly where bin Laden was a entire month prior to the end of his term he could have taken him out, but oh, I forgot and his cruise missle raid missed him by just “hours”.
“All of your screams of Clinton this and Clinton that do not change what Bush did, or didn’t do in the runnup to 9/11.”
Agreed, but there is a HUGE difference in 7 months of inaction and one attack vs. 8 years MULTIPLE attacks.
Question: Do you not fault Clinton for allowing al Qaeda to grow astronomically in strength during the 1990s or more importantly not shutting his terrorist organization after letting the U.S. be hit so many times?
April 10th, 2006 at 4:53 pm#45
Luck has nothing to do with it…and you know it. Are you trying to be funny? Osama? No, I haven’t seen him lately. I suspect hiding so far underground out of fear for your life tends to make you very apprehensive about showing your face in public.
April 10th, 2006 at 4:59 pm#47 – Re luck — no, actually, I don’t know it. How do you know it?
Re Osama — Hiding? Maybe. Laughing his ass off at us? Yes.
Did you happen to notice when Osama and his right-hand man recently made direct threats of attack on the US, the terror alert color code thingy didn’t budge from yellow to red — not even yellow to orange.
And yes, I try to be funny as often as possible — but looks aren’t everything.
April 10th, 2006 at 5:23 pm#46 – Tracy,
April 10th, 2006 at 5:29 pmal Qaeda grew astronomically in strength during the Reagan and Bush 41 administrations and they eagerly supported it. It was in stasis during Clinton’s administration as Clinton had ceased aid to this organization of terrorists financed by the two prior Republican administrations.
[...] Think Progress [...]
April 10th, 2006 at 5:43 pm#49
“It was in stasis during Clinton’s administration as Clinton had ceased aid to this organization of terrorists financed by the two prior Republican administrations.”
What are you smoking? The U.S supported the Mujahideen AGAINST the Soviets during the 1980s, which was NOT a international terrorist organization at the time. In case you missed it, al Qaeda didn’t even become an international terrorist organization untill after the first Gulf War and after bin Laden was kicked out of Saudi Arabia in 1991. BTW “Al Qaeda”, as an organization wasn’t formed untill 1991, after King Fahd allowed the U.S. to station bases on Saudi soil. MOST of al Qaeda’s strength and sophistication grew during the 1990s. MULTIPLE al Qaeda attacks against the U.S. happened during the 1990s.
April 10th, 2006 at 6:21 pm#48
“Re luck — no, actually, I don’t know it.”
Well you should.
“Laughing his ass off at us?”
Being in isolation for so long tends to make people get a little crazy and hysterical.
“Did you happen to notice when Osama and his right-hand man recently made direct threats of attack on the US, the terror alert color code thingy didn’t budge from yellow to red — not even yellow to orange.”
More of the same from these two characters from deep inside their cave.
“And yes, I try to be funny as often as possible — but looks aren’t everything.”
Well you out did yourself this time.
April 10th, 2006 at 6:33 pm“What are you smoking? The U.S supported the Mujahideen AGAINST the Soviets during the 1980s, which was NOT a international terrorist organization at the time. Tracy”
The Mujahideen WAS a terrorist organization – they fought the soviets, much like they fight us in Iraq now. Claiming we invaded a muslim country (same charge) just as the soviets did. The modern Al Queda is in fact the SAME Mujahideen we TRAINED and FUNDED in Afghanistan you retarded MORON. In fact Osama fought in Afghanistan after our training against the russians.
Yes little Pansy Boy, Osama is a creation of the Pakistani IS and the CIA.
“In case you missed it, al Qaeda didn’t even become an international terrorist organization untill after the first Gulf War and after bin Laden was kicked out of Saudi Arabia in 1991. BTW “Al Qaedaâ€, as an organization wasn’t formed untill 1991, after King Fahd allowed the U.S. to station bases on Saudi soil. Tracy”
Sorry Pansy Boy – Wikipedia and HISTORY disagree with you. Were you ALWAYS this stupid, or did you just get hit in the head with a hammer recently?
Get another job Pansy boy, a troll is beyond your skills. You just look STUPID on this site.
April 10th, 2006 at 8:32 pmThanks, Ryan -
April 10th, 2006 at 10:16 pmI fell asleep at the wheel. Being an old fart sometimes leads to lapses in time. On the other hand, having lived history is different from learning it from books. At best, Tracy is twelve, or perhaps that is its IQ.
#52 – Well you out did yourself this time.
April 10th, 2006 at 10:18 pmI usually do. Thanks.
Daily show time. I’m out for a while.
April 10th, 2006 at 10:52 pmThe question in November will be who(sic) do you trust to better protect America from terrorists? IT won’t be the party who wants to make it more difficult to wiretap terrorists and “kill the Patriot Act.â€
Comment by Unemployment Rate – 4.7%
To Dubious Unemployment Rate,
April 11th, 2006 at 2:17 amEven if the Bush administration is wiretapping terrorists only (which I personally doubt), the undisputed fact is that the various US intelligence agencies
are sorely lacking in translators/interpreters capable of rendering their messages from Arabic, Farsi, Urdu, etc. into English. There are already hundreds of thousands of hours in backlog of intercepted messages that remain untranslated. As long as the Bush administration shows no interest in developing a program to teach intelligence agents Arabic and other languages likely to be spoken by Muslim terrorists the way FDR did with Japanese-language training almost immediately after Pearl Harbor, even if significant messages are picked up, they will probably get translated too late, like the message intercepted on 9/10/2001 that referred to “tomorrow as a day of glory” but which wasn’t put into English until well after 9/11.
I wish one of you reichwingers would offer a decent explanation of who is going to translate all those wiretapped messages.
#53
“The Mujahideen WAS a terrorist organization – they fought the soviets, much like they fight us in Iraq now.”
A terrorist is someone who intentionally kills civilians for a political purpose. The Mujahideen didn’t make a habit of killing civilians to advance their Soviet resistance cause in the 1980s. Those in Iraq who engage U.S. forces, I don’t consider to be terrorists; however, when they blow up mosques and markets killing innocent civilians, then they are terrorists.
“The modern Al Queda is in fact the SAME Mujahideen we TRAINED and FUNDED in Afghanistan”
Bin Laden took various elements of the Mujahideen after the Soviets left and formed today’s al Qaeda AFTER the first Gulf War in 1991. This is when bin Laden adopted the use of blind civilian killing as a tool to wage his war against the “infidels”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Qaeda
“After speaking publicly against the Saudi government for harboring American troops he was quickly forced into exile to Sudan and his Saudi citizenship was revoked. Shortly afterwards the movement which came to be known as al-Qaeda was formed.”
April 11th, 2006 at 3:32 pmTracy, read your link in #58. Can you read? From your link:
“The origins of al-Qaeda can be traced to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, when a cadre of non-Afghani, Arab Muslim fighters joined the largely United States and Pakistan-funded Afghan mujÄhidÄ«n anti-Russian resistance movement. Osama bin Laden, a member of a prominent Saudi Arabian business family, led an informal grouping which became a leading fundraiser and recruitment agency for the Afghan cause in Muslim countries; it channelled Islamic fighters to the conflict, distributed money and provided logistical skills and resources to both fighting forces and Afghan refugees.
After the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989 many committed veterans of the war wished to fight for Islamic causes elsewhere. The invasion and occupation of Kuwait by Iraq in 1990 saw US and coalition troops sent to Saudi Arabia in preparedness for expelling Iraqi occupying forces from Kuwait. Al-Qaeda was strongly opposed to the secular regime of Saddam Hussein and bin Laden had offered use of his fighters’ services to the Saudi throne, but the deployment of ‘infidel’ forces to Islamic sacred territory was seen as an act of treachery by bin Laden. He placed the grouping in militant opposition to the United States and its allies. Al-Qaeda came to claim the U.S. military presence in several Islamic countries (particularly Saudi Arabia), the U.S. support for Israel in the Arab-Israeli conflict, and more recently the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq as reasons for militant action.
Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri are senior members of al-Qaeda’s shura council, and are believed to be in contact with some of al-Qaeda’s other cells.”
Why ever do you provide a link to a page that refutes your argument? Perhaps, you hope that others will not open the link.
April 11th, 2006 at 4:58 pm#59
You need to read a little further than the first few of paragraphs.
“After some deliberation the Saudi Monarch refused bin Laden’s offer and instead opted to allow United States and allied forces to deploy on his territory. Bin Laden considered this a treacherous deed. He believed that the presence of foreign troops in the “land of the two mosques” (Mecca and Medina) profaned sacred soil. After speaking publicly against the Saudi government for harboring American troops he was quickly forced into exile to Sudan and his Saudi citizenship was revoked.
Shortly afterwards the movement which came to be known as al-Qaeda was formed.”
April 11th, 2006 at 6:12 pmTracy,
April 11th, 2006 at 6:31 pmYou and your fellow reichwingers still haven’t given a reasonable explanation of why 4 and 1/2 years after 9/11 the Bush administration still hasn’t developed a program to increase the number of US intelligence agents capable of translating/interpreting the languages likely to be used by potential terrorists. What’s the point of collecting intelligence and intercepting calls/e-mails if they are going to remain untranslated for months and months? Getting an adequate number of intelligence officers competent in Arabic, Farsi and other languages spoken in Muslim countries should be one of the most basic steps in fighting terrorism, but the Bush administration still hasn’t taken it. In reality, the Busheviks are all talk but ultimately very weak on terror.
#61
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/boulet200310080856.asp
This article was posted in 2003. What is the current situation now? Do you have some links to recent articles citing this problem?
April 11th, 2006 at 7:05 pm#62
April 11th, 2006 at 7:24 pmThe news that the US State Department still has only 10 employees fluent in Arabic was on this site about two months ago. I don’t have newer links, but the fact is that shortly after Pearl Harbor the FDR government set up intensive Japanese-language training schools (the Navy one in particular produced top-notch translators/interpreters), and that the Bush administration has done nothing similar to produce more people competent in Arabic and other languages spoken in Muslim countries.
Incidentally, both Kerry and Edwards brought up the matters of the hundreds of thousands of hours of backlog in untranslated interceptions from terror suspects, and both Bush and Cheney didn’t deny it but simply avoided giving a proper answer. Since the language schools like those set up for Japanese after Pearl Harbor simply don’t exist, I have no reason to believe that the situation has improved.
#63 – Lora,
April 11th, 2006 at 8:20 pmWorst yet, I have dozens of Arabic speaking friends. At least three of them are multi-fluent, able to speak and translate all of the dialects. Problem is that they were born in the near east. One is in the Navy and took the CIA test and passed it without reference material (He did not realize that he could bring in cheat sheets and dictionaries.). Unfortunately he was born in Lebanon and still has kin there.
#64 Walt,
April 12th, 2006 at 6:58 amPerhaps even worst or at least equally worst is that according to a surprisingly good article a few years back in the conservative “Weekly Standard,” which one of my cousins gets, even with American-born American citizens who apply to be work for the CIA, there tends to be suspicion towards those who have spent a lot of time overseas. But, of course, those who have spent some time abroad are the ones who are most likely to be conversant in a foreign language or two, including its slang and perhaps some of its dialects.
#63
You don’t think that they are having trouble recruiting because potential candidates are fearful of their own lives if it were revealed that they were helping the U.S. government…do you?
April 12th, 2006 at 12:57 pm#66
April 12th, 2006 at 5:22 pmThat may be a very small part of the problem. But what I have been pointing out several times is that shortly after the Pearl Harbor attack the FDR government set up schools for intensive Japanese language training for young AMERICAN CITIZENS–given the times–mostly Caucasian men. This history should be known to some people in the current government, but 4 1/2 years following 9/11 no similar program has been developed for Arabic and other Middle Eastern languages. And just in case you haven’t figured it out, more time has now passed since 9/11 than between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII. Any more excuses?
#67
I think it’s a huge part of the problem especially for Arabic or Muslim men and women and given today’s easy access to personal information that was not even avaliable to anyone back in the 1940s. As far as setting up public language schools, you assume that today’s American citizen would feel the need to actually participate in these classes given that it could only be VOLUNTARY and considering that there are so many that don’t actually even consider this “war on terror” to even be a war or anything like the the U.S was engaged in during WW2.
BTW if we are talking about using all the possible tools at our disposal to try and prevent terrorism, then why isn’t the outdated and impractical FISA law not being dropped in favor of a new one that reflects the current threat?
April 12th, 2006 at 6:11 pm#68
April 12th, 2006 at 7:03 pmStop changing the subject. You have absolutely no idea how many Americans would be willing to learn Arabic, Farsi, or whatever, because there aren’t such schools in the first place. Secondly, the intensive Japanese language training schools set up by FDR after Pearl Harbor were mainly within units of the military and intelligence agencies. In other words, certain members of the Navy, for example, who were judged to have an aptitude or interest in learning a foreign language were sent to the very excellent Navy Language School, which in reality produced some of the top-knotch Japanese translators/interpreters.
Whether or not the FISA law, which in fact allows for a warrant to be obtained retroactively, is changed, the US intelligence agencies don’t have the capability of translating any intercepted messages into English for several months in the first place. It is a well-documented fact that a call intercepted on Sept. 10, 2001 between the terrorists referring to “tomorrow as our day of glory” wasn’t translated until months after the event. Under the current situation, the same thing could very well happen again. If you were really concerned with fighting terror, you would insist that this government do something about training linguists capable of understanding the potential terrorists’ messages. It is the first and most basic step. If you don’t get that yet, please don’t bother me with any more silly escuses.
#69
I am not saying I don’t agree with setting up these programs I am just raising questions as to the fesability given today’s global information climate. I posted this link hoping you would read it. It specifically talks about the shortage of translators and ways on how to increase the recruits.
http://www.nationalreview.com/ comment/ boulet200310080856.asp
April 12th, 2006 at 7:22 pm#71
April 12th, 2006 at 7:41 pmI read your link already. I’m glad the conservative “National Review” and “Weekly Standard” have shown interest in this issue; I regret that the Bush administration hasn’t yet.
As for feasbility, isn’t it at least worth try, rather than sitting back and allowing hundreds of thousands of hours of untranslated backlog to continue piling up? Please note that I am a professional translator/interpreter of Asian languages; so I think I know what I’m talking about here, even though the languages are different.
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