Bush Steal an Election? Nah..
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You see this administration likes covert operations when they benefit and support their illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq. Covert CIA agents specializing in WMD proliferation, who question their illegalities, need not apply. The Washington Post reported yesterday that "President Bush authorized covert plans last year to support the election campaigns of Iraqis with close ties to the White House." The National Security Council spokesman Frederick Jones would not say whether any political parties had benefited from covert support. However, government and intelligence officials said on Sunday that the plan was scrapped before the January vote. And that the Bush administration backed down after congressional objections.
In an upcoming issue, the New Yorker magazine begs to differ. The New Yorker reports that despite congressional objections, the White House went ahead with the covert plan to bolster the campaign of Ayad Allawi, "who had been installed by the United States as Iraq's interim prime minister in 2004 and who worked closely with the CIA during his years as an Iraqi exile. Allawi, a secular Shiite, did better than expected in the election but not strongly enough to retain his leadership role. "
The New Yorker article includes the assertion that the program was carried out by former CIA officers and relied on funding not controlled by Congress. Rep. Jane Harman (Calif.,) the House intelligence committee's senior Democrat, said in a statement that "Congress was consulted about the Administration's posture in the Iraqi election. I was personally consulted. But if the (Bush) administration did what is alleged, that would be a violation of the covert action requirements, and that would be deeply troubling."
posted by Lisa @ 8:18 AM
11 comments
11 Comments:
I guess its simply the point of view that I have, but what I got out of it was two things: (1)The Whitehouse was considering covert support of 'their' guys, figured out it wasn't workable, and dropped it and (2)Iran, another foreign country, WAS doing all it could to influence the election, including stuff they shouldn't have. Now here's where I take issue with how things are reported and what's emphasized by the media. Where's the outrage over what Iran was doing? The larger issue here is one of Moral Equivalency. Somehow, Iran gets a pass from everyone about their part in the election in Iraq, and the United States, in running ideas on counteracting what Iran was doing up the flagpole and ultimately nixing them, is the bad guy. The focus is on something the US was considering, for which there is no hard evidence ever happened and NOT on the countries actually breaking the rules. Ordinarily, I would chalk it up to everyday politics, whose ox was being gored, etc., but we need to wake up here. That part of the world is full of people that are religious extremists that want to kill us all, including you and me. They'll kill anyone, including children (ON PURPOSE!) to satisfy their aims. Somehow, we're worse than that? Somehow, trying to create security by introducing democratic ideas into a black hole of extremism is worse than indiscriminate killing for Allah? No way.
That last post really shows, why people all over the world hate americans more and more. Actually they hate the U.S. foreign policy, but too make it easy, they hate "THE AMERICANS."
The Problems are:
Why don't americans solve there own problems, instead of pointing on other countries.
If the Iran is doing things wrong, then it is bad. Yes. But the blog was about an U.S. mistake.
Moral Equivalency must be an american or jewish way of thinking. People in other countries think, that if somebody is doing something wrong, one shouldn't do something else even more wrong to correct the wrong-doing of somebody else.
That last paragraph is really strange.
"...introducing democratic ideas into a black hole of extremism..."
How about you just stay home and fix your own "democrazy"?
You are just treating the symptons of a disease (Terrorism), but you don't have a real cure.
Think about where and why the Extremism arises.
Do you really think, that there is this little ten year old boy sitting somewhere in bagdad thinking "how about I bomb the U.S. embassy today?"
I give you a clue, how it might have developed:
(very short) U.S. needs oil. Let's take over a country, which has a lot of oil fields and install a U.S. friendly government (King, Queen, Dictator... whatever comes along), leave several thousand U.S. soldiers to keep the citizens quiet. All the money from the country resources goes to U.S. companys and the U.S. friendly government. Inhabitants of the country get angry, but can't do anything against the U.S. soldiers. That situation remains stable over some years until people get so mad about it, that they choose the only way left to fight the surpressors: terrorism.
I don't like terrorism, but I can understand, how it develops.
Isn't it strange, that the terrorists just choose certain countries for the attacks? If they just wouldn't like christians or people from western countries, the attacks would hit every country. Strange, right?
Did you ever hear about a terrorists threads in Luxembourg, Austria or Slovenia? I hope you know these countries ;-)
And hopefully they are big enough to be considered important by an U.S. citizen.
By the way: Is there any country, that regards the U.S. as there friends? I don't mean the government, but the people.
The majority in Europe (btw 2 times more inhabitants then the U.S.)
don't like the U.S. anymore and don't think, that the U.S. are a democrazy anymore.
e.g. in germany the supreme court recently decided, that statements of witnesses made in the U.S. can't be taken serious anymore, because the chances of torture in U.S. prisons are too high. So the german court sees the U.S. on the same level with Iray BEFORE the war.
Well, where should I begin? Anonymous, I can only presume, is not American. I will also consider the 'american or jewish way of thinking' remark as veiled anti-semitism. I'll consider the last as one strike against them in having any kind of rational discourse. Having said that, I'm wondering if Anonymous had heard of Mr. Van Gogh's murder in Amsterdam at the hands of a radical Islamist. This article from ABC news dated 12 July 2005. Quoting now...
"Mohammed Bouyeri was accused of killing Theo van Gogh as he cycled to work in Amsterdam on Nov. 2, 2004. He was charged with shooting and stabbing Van Gogh before slashing his throat and pinning a note to his body with a knife in broad daylight."
"I did what I did purely out my beliefs," the 27-year-old Muslim told judges after entering court clutching a Koran.
"The bearded suspect, dressed in a black robe and black and white headscarf, praised Allah and the Prophet Mohammad before admitting to the killing on the second day of his trial in Amsterdam's high-security court."
So, Mr. Van Gogh was neither an American or a Jew or part the invading force in Iraq. He was merely a Dutch filmmaker trying to point out Islam's (mis)treatment of women through his chosen art. Yet he was murdered.
There is my point about Moral Equivalency. I wholeheartedly agree that no one in the U.S. government should be trying to set up a puppet regime of any kind, whether through invasion or participation in democratic elections in a covert way. If that's the case, fire the bastards. Bloggers like Lisa are vital to keeping bloggers like me and America at large, honest. But, we keep missing the point. All we've got concerning this 'covert operation' are allegations through unnamed sources through liberally slanted media sources.
In any event, nobody died. No one was murdered. Mr. Van Gogh, a man with no apparent or actual connection with American foreign policy or commensurate covert actions was, by a radical Islamic extremist. You look at where the death and destruction of terrorism lay, and you'll find Islamic extremists that have hijacked a whole religion. We didn't make them that way. They got that way all on their own. I can think of a lot of names to call our elected officials, Democrat and Republican alike, but 'murdering religious extremist' ain't one of them.
Until we all understand there's Good and Evil, with Good not always being perfect, but Evil always being Evil, our days of being able to have these discourses is numbered. They'll kill all of us...
Yes, I'm not American. I'm European. I'm not religious, the religion I would consider the closest to my way of thinking is the Christian religion.
And there is this way of thinking: "If somebody hits you on your cheek, then also show hin the other cheek. (Hopefully I translated that correct). The Jewish religion has a different opinion on this topic. Therefore my sentence.
I was studying in the U.S., came there several times for holidays, have many friends in the U.S. (many are jewish) and I love that country. I thought about immigrating, but the current foreign policy of the U.S. really shocked me.
I know that case, you are mentioning. There are many cases like this all over the world. But not only muslim kill christian. Catholics kill protestants (last week again in Belfast, Northern Ireland). Jewish settlers kill Arabs. Shiites kill Sunnites. and so on.
Most of them are used by some religious leaders who just want "the best" for them and are really perfect in propaganda.
These cases have not much in common with terrorism except for the killing of people. Killing somebody for a religious reason is like killing somebody for racists reasons. The murder believes his group to be superior to other groups and is doing everthing to "protect" his group.
For my view about development of terrorism see my former post. Maybe one can understand the difference.
Maybe one can understand the difference when you see the example of greece. The inhabitants are mostly orthodoks (most similar to conservative catholic). There are some jewish people and very few muslims.
At the end of the 70s, beginning of the 80s the greeks found out, that there former dictator was supported by the CIA. In 1974 the dictator was replaced by an democracy.
Until today the greeks are demonstrating every year in front of the U.S. embassy to remind the world, that the U.S. installed a dictator in greece and surpressed the greeks. Guess what the average greek in greece tells you about the U.S. today. Until today greece is the only member of the European union, which citicens are not allowed to visit the U.S. without going through this tough visa procedure. The U.S. are afraid of the greeks (for a good reason) and they are not muslims.
This is just an example of many countries.
People keep this in mind for a long time.
It is absolutely okay that every country is pursuing its own interst first. But if you make decision, which have a great impact on other countries or you mistreat the people of other countries, then people start disliking you.
The worst thing is, when you start doing this in public and don't even care about the other countries opinions.
Recent topics are:
IRAQ War and War in Afghanistan(the majority of the world regards these wars as wars of aggression by the U.S. and great britain)
Guantanamo (of course)
Kyoto protocoll
International Court of Justice
wiretapping in the UN building
echolon
ICANN
Bushs favourite ambassadors (people who donate money to the republicans) in canada, germany, belgium....
I really appreciate Anonymous being upfront about his background. However, it is within that background that I see the reason for the perspective. As to mine, I am unabashedly a sold-out Christian, middle-aged, white American. Lisa, I hope you don't mind the use of your space for some Scriptural references.
BTW, the reference to turning the other cheek is more the manner of not retaliating for insults, not as one might surmise, letting someone assault you repeatedly. The reference is found both in the books of Luke and Matthew. However, reading further in the book of Luke, Jesus also said that a well armed man protects his home, emphasizing the need to defend oneself, his family, and his possessions. Christians aren't supposed to be wimps, but they have given a much higher standard to adhere to. Its not enough to merely not steal or kill as a sin, now the thought of wanting to steal or kill is just as bad.
The point of all this is that religion deals with absolutes. That is, its either wrong or right. There's no middle ground. Secularism has no absolutes. Its much easier not to adhere to any absolute idea of what may be wrong or right and 'go with the flow'. So, the comments you made saying this group or that or this individual or that kills another and that its all pretty much the same thing, is erroneous.
I certainly won't make any excuses about American foreign policy. Our country had made some grievious errors over the years. But, let me give you one historical example of the dynamic we're dealing with. During World War II, we wound up being allies with Russia. Now, considering who Stalin was and what he did to his people, it would be easy to say we should never had allied ourselves with him. However the threat of Nazi Germany really over-rode that. Once the war was over, we didn't become bosom buddies with Stalin. Certainly everything associated with the "Cold War" over the next 50 years was our having to deal with Communism AFTER an immediate threat of Nazism was dealt with. We shouldn't have let Eastern Europe fall into Russia's hands. Its just now becoming what it should have been 50 years ago. Our mistake. We should have gone into Vietnam to win, and we abandoned a whole country and a whole region to death and loss of freedom. Our mistake.
I think the current policy in the Middle East reflects the lessons learned from Eastern Europe and Vietnam, that gamesmanship and using the 'enemy of the enemy is my friend' diplomacy is only short-term at best. The only way to bring the kind of stability, freedom and prosperity that Europe, Japan, and Korea have enjoyed (mainly due to our efforts to keep them 'free' countries)is to do the same thing in the Middle East. As a practical matter, its good policy for us, and for every individual in those countries, its a mandate for us here that enjoy such freedoms and prosperity to allow others the chance to choose to do the same.
Well, religion is a big field. Many misunderstandings and wrongdoings in history of nearly every religion (just remember the crusades).
Then in every religion people interpret sentences of the leaders differently. But that is not the point here, sorry.
I guess, regarding foreign policy you understood more then many of your politicans already.
Concerning Vietnam I share your thoughts (either you go in and win or you stay out).
BUT that doesn't lead to the conclusion, that you have to go in everywhere today.
How about you just stay home? That idea doesn't seem to be very welcome.
Let's take Iraq as an example:
Let's go back to 2002. Let's say Saddam has weapons of mass destruction. As the U.S. are far away why should they bother? The best rockets the Iraquis had, would deliver the nuclear or whatever bomb maybe to Germany, but not even to Great Britain. And most of the middle European countries weren't even worried. Are they all stupid? Do they all have no intelligence agencies? Don't they have friends in the gulf region?
Maybe bringing democracy to the gulf region and destroying weapons of mass destruction weren't the reasons?
Maybe there were other reasons?
To make it clearer: Let's see, which countries were absolutely against the war: Russia, France and Germany.
Russia and France had treaties with Iraq about oil deliveries and Germany was over ten years the most important trade partner of Iraq.
Those three countries didn't have very nice reasons to object the war like the U.S. went to Iraq for Oil. That's all. Russia got more freedom in their "fight on terror" in the countries south of Russia. Germany and France are still pissed off.
Sad as it is, on this political level, it's all about money. Sorry.
And then another question: Why do western countries have to bring democracy to everybody?
Only because we like democracy? What gives us the right to let everybody live in democracy? Maybe some people want to live in a kingdom or want to be ruled by a leader? I don't know, if that is the case, but nobody can prove, that it is not the case. And just because some people think, that it might be like this, one shouldn't destroy a whole country, kill thousands of inhabitants and risk a civil war.
There are many examples of peaceful revolutions, where no third party had to bring democracy. It takes longer, but the democracy lasts longer, because it was the peoples choice.
Anonymous:
You make my point. Granted, world history (including the Bible) is full of people twisting religion(s) to their own ends. Not making excuses as to the historical excesses. What you have here is just such a case where Islam is being hijacked by religious extremist thugs as a way to gain control, literally, of the whole world. While they're at it, they'll kill anyone that gets in their way. Conversely, dieing in the process nets them 72 virgins. I don't know what the women get if they die for Allah. I guess that speaks to my point about the religion being hijacked into false beliefs. Converting the whole world to an extremist version of Islam, killing everyone that doesn't march in step, including you and me, and being 100% willing to die in the process. That IS the goal for these people. Its a war you're in whether you've chosen to participate or not.
If you'll remember George Bush's intentions leading up to his first election, his preference was to stay out global affairs. As it has been in World War I, World War II, the Cold War, Korea, and most recently, 9/11 and the Middle East today, the mantle has been thrust upon us. We certainly never asked for it. Public opinion leading up to Pearl Harbor in 1941 was split evenly 50/50 for and against. Somebody keeps flashing the Bat-Signal up in the sky for us, Anonymous. We have the wherewithal, the wealth, and the responsibility. As it has been said, 'for whom much has been given, much is required.' Its our duty, long story short. I sure as heck didn't volunteer to save the world from every bad guy that shows up. The job is ours to do because there is no one else to do it. It would be nice if some more people would pitch in...
Your idea of letting Europe handle it is the same type of thinking that allowed Hitler, Mussolini and Japan to get as far as they did, at a cost of millions of innocent lives.
Why democracy? Look at any country on this planet that has democratic institutions firmly in place and tell me they're no different than a Taliban, Saddam, Iran, Arafat, Qaddafi, the royal family in Saudi Arabia, or any other repressive regime in how they behave. Democracies foster peaceful nations that want to get along. Why Democracy? Because it works. As was once said by Winston Churchill, Democracy is a terrible form of government. We only use it because its better than any other kind, to paraphrase.
Am I to assume that either Middle Eastern people either don't deserve freedom to choose, or that there's something wrong with them that Democracy wouldn't work there?
The proof is that anyone coming here can fulfill any dream they have the courage to dream. What has the Middle East accomplished in the last 1500 years? Nothing. No science, no literature, no art, no philosophy, no nothing except continuous repression of its people.
well, there are some thoughts I can share, but some statements are neither correct nor does it help to make them.
e.g. "What has the Middle East accomplished in the last 1500 years? Nothing. No science, no literature, no art, no philosophy, no nothing except continuous repression of its people."
I'm not willing to discuss this.
There is one point, we can't agree on.
You think, somebody has to bring democracy to the world. And if nobody else is doing it, the U.S. have to do it.
I'm not discussing, who should do it, because I doubt already, that somebody has to do it.
And if the U.S. forces countries to discuss it, then I would suggest the UN is deciding it. That could be a nice start for another debate.
Back to the point: I agree with Churchill. I prefer a nice dictator and also real communism, but as both doesn't work out, I wish democracy in my country. But other countries shouldn't be forced to have democracy. We can stop trade with them, convince them of a better system, give presents... but not war.
The problem is, that the U.S. government is using the american people for their personal interests. The soldiers fight for freedom, democracy and a better world. They can't understand why the Iraqis don't like them also the U.S. troops just try their best to help.
You can only understand it, when you see the real reasons for the war:
oil supply and a lot of money for companies owned by the U.S. governemnt or friends of these politicans. It would take a lot of pages to proove this point. I will skip that and just say, that I believe, that these are the facts.
As long as these problems exists, one can't believe in the nice idea of bringing peace and democracy to the world. It is just a nice reason for the public, but not the real reason behind the recent wars.
Let me pick myself off the floor. I'm sure some of what you'r writing is the result of a language barrier in expressing or understanding American idioms, but you've got to be kidding!
What Churchill said was Democracy was terrible, but even at that, its better than any other form of government. In other words, Churchill preferred Democracy to any other form of government, he just acknowledged its drawbacks.
You prefer a 'nice' dictator or Communism in your country, and if they don't work out, give Democracy a shot? I'm beginning to wonder what part of 'europe' you say you're from. It must be a terrible place to live, to prefer dictatorship or communism as a form of government.
By the way, I'm hoping you don't want a Taliban or Saddam style of government in your country, do you?
Lets be realistic. I know of no policy where the United States is forcing anyone to accept Democracy as their chosen form of government at gunpoint under threat of death. If that were the case, we'd be engaged in military action in perhaps dozens of countries, killing all those millions of 'stupid' people wanting to remain under the rule of ruthless dictators. Heaven forbid if people actually have freedom of choice!
On the other hand, you have a slew of Islamic extremists wanting to impose their world view and form of government on the whole world, and willing to kill everyone on the planet in the process. At the risk of raising another argument, that's the moral equivalency issue that you simply can't get around.
We can argue policy and tactics concerning the circumstances surrounding the invasion of Iraq, but we have to do so in the context of terrorist attacks that reached a high point with 9/11. Add in all the other attacks and its a global issue, whether you're in the US or Egypt or Indonesia or Saudi Arabia. If you want your family blown up by an Islamic radical, just be patient. They'll get to them eventually. On the other hand, taking this war to them and fighting them wherever they are is the way I would prefer to handle this threat.
You misunderstood me.
I live in a very democratic system.
A nice dictator or real communism would be nice. BUT as I know, that these two forms of government are theoretically good, practically they are not possible. So I prefer like Churchill a democratic system.
The connection between Iraq and 9/11 is like the connection between oil and democracy. Before the war, there was none.
"Lets be realistic. I know of no policy where the United States is forcing anyone to accept Democracy as their chosen form of government at gunpoint under threat of death. If that were the case, we'd be engaged in military action in perhaps dozens of countries, killing all those millions of 'stupid' people wanting to remain under the rule of ruthless dictators. Heaven forbid if people actually have freedom of choice!"
Well, the U.S. is engaged in military action in dozens of countries. They have there soldiers in nearly every country. Not in every country they support democratic structures, most of the times they support a king or a dictator. They just say, that they would like to bring Democracy to the world.
I feel secure in my country. We don't have terror attacks and the terrorists have no reason to attack us. We don't steal the oil of other countries. We try to help other countries in a peaceful way. We respect all religions. We try to avoid every war and we don't influence other countries through military force. We only try to convince people. Therefore my countries politicians are nearly always welcome as mediators.
No connection whatsoever? Now we're not looking a 'smoking gun' here, but check this out:
http://www.husseinandterror.com/
If we were trying to pin anything on Mother Teresa, we might have to give her the benefit of the doubt, but its Saddam Hussein, with a motive not make these connections with terrorists public knowledge.
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