Bush Must Go
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Mark Smith     June 2004+

Table of Contents
Bush, Bushites, & Their Damn Crusade in Iraq
750_Injured_Flown_Out_of_Iraq_Each_Month Bill_Maher_Commenting_on_George_Bush Emboldening_The_Terrorists Brokeback_Mountain_II AN_APOLOGY_FROM_A_BUSH_VOTER DEMONcrats Drive_Out_The_Bush_Regime Memo_On_Torture Lied_Into_War Bushs_Crappy_Crusade_in_Iraq (& # of dead) Bush_Family_Values Terror_Alert_Prediction Set_Free..._of_George_Bush Expect_a_Stupid_President_to_do_Stupid_Things A_Letter_to_All_Who_Voted_for_George_W._Bush The_Ever-Changing_Storyline_of_WHY_We_Invaded_Iraq Iraqiization_of_the_War_a_Total_Failure Republicans_and_Lynching-_Hand_in_Hand Who_is_Worse-_Clinton_or_Bush Bush-_That_Sinking_Feeling Save_America_from_Saddam Free_Trade Amend_The_Constitution George_Galloway-_Iraq_War_Based_on_Pack_of_Lies Three_Strikes_for_Rumsfeld To_Honor_the_Dead Bush_the_Good_Christian_LIAR Oliver_Cromwell_&_The_Air_Force_Academy Persecution_Complex	Click on the finger to play the video. Opens in its own separate window. "I will set a different tone. I will restore civility and respect to our national politics. ... I will work with Republicans and reach out to Democrats ... I will treat the other party with respect, and when we make progress, I will share the credit. ... I will unite our nation, not divide it. I will bring Americans together." George Bush, April 2000   Tee Shirt (no longer) Available Due to the dismal lack of sales on this item, I have decided to pull it from the market. There weren't enough sales to make it profitable, only irritating. Rhetoric -vs- Reality: we've heard the rhetoric, and now we've lived thru the reality. See for yourself with the video above exactly how Bush is "restoring civility and respect" in the post-Clinton era. As for Christian presidents, Bush isn't worthy to even wash the feet of Jimmy Carter. Can you even IMAGINE Carter doing something like flipping off America? Regardless, you Fundies are all thinking:  Thank goodness we have such a good and devout Christians leading our country!!! Bush & Cheney are such  better moral examples to our young people than that... BILL CLINTON, who had- gasp! SEX outside of marriage. Who did he think he was anyway, a man of the cloth such as Rev. Jimmy Swaggart or Rev. Jim Bakker, carrying on that way?
Blood_on_Fundy_Hands The_Illegal_Invasion_&_Occupation_of_Iraq Bush_Redneck_Supporter_of_The_Year_Award Sweet_Neo_Con_(The_Rolling_Stones) Misc_Quotes_&_Thoughts	Doonesbury, for Sunday, July 24, 2005. We can only dream...
While_Rome_Burned__(Bush_and_Nero_the_same) A_Piece_of_Work-_Just_How_Low_Can_Bush_Go ? .True_Love.. Hundreds_of_US_Soldiers_Wasted_in_A-Wreck Inner_Moral_Compass??? $1,000_Per_Person:_The_Cost_of_Bushs_Crusade_(so_far)	John Bolton- Bush's latest turd tossed into the international punch bowl. WWIII  here we come!!!
The_Christian_Reich Bush_the_Christian_Hypocrite GOD_HELP_AMERICA Sheep  (by Mark Smith) Misc_Items,_Thoughts,_Comments
Pre-Election 2004 Items
INTRODUCTION (Pre-Election) List_of_Reasons_Bush_Must_Go_ Oprah_Slaps_Bush Hometown_Paper_of_Bush_Endorses_Kerry  (excellent!) Bush_Bored_With_Fighting_Terrorism Bushisms-_Stupidities_or_Freudian_Slips??? The_Bush_Monkey
The_Anti-Christ Misc_Quotes_and_Snippets Books_&_Movies Bushtianity_and_Bushtians-_Fundy_Christians_LOVE_Bush The_Conservative_Case_for_Kerry
Manipulating_The_Data Great_Links Significant_News_Articles Humor-_What_is_Funny_About_This_Election Why_Fundy-Mental_Christians_Support_Bush
Jihad_Joe Graphical_Representation-_US_Soldiers_Killed_in_Iraq Al_Gore_Rips_Bush_a_New_One Al_Gore_Speaks_on_Iraq Seymour_Hershs_ACLU_Keynote_Speech_Transcribed Bush_Fucked_Over_McCain_in_2000 Feeling_the_Draft Nickle_and_Diming_the_War-_STILL_No_Armor_Even_in_October_2004
Bush_Likes_Waffles_How_About_This_One! Rev._Al_Sharpton_at_the_DNC_Convention_July_28_2004 I_Feel_Like_Im_Fixing_to_Die-__Anti-War_Lyrics Missing_In_Action-_from_the_New_York_Times A_Flip_and_a_Flop_and_Now_Just_a_Flop-__Michael_Moore Muzzling_Soldiers_Is_Nothing_New-_by_David_Hackworth Why_We_Cannot_Win-__Sgt_Al_Lorentz,_Iraq Jokes Bibliography	O What a Tangled Web We Weave... When First We Practice to Deceive.

Bush, Bushites, & Their Damn Crusade in Iraq

'We Will, In Fact, Be Greeted As Liberators'

Pre-War Prediction of Dick Cheney, Meet The Press, March 16, 2003

750 Injured Flown Out of Iraq Each Month 

750 Per Month, Thanks to George Bush

This is the average number of American soldiers that are injured so severely that they are flown out of Iraq on hospital flights to Germany, month in and month out, last month, this month, and every month to come, thanks to George Bush- and those genius Christian Fundies that re-elected him. Bush has these Americans driving around Baghdad etc. just to provide target practice for Islamic snipers and bombers.  And let me remind the gung-ho pro-any-war types; there's no "glory" in coming back from a war with a life-long brain injury, wearing a dirty diaper and drooling on yourself for the rest of your life.

Just one out of 750 every month Marine Sgt. Ty Ziegel

Support The Troops        Supporting the troops should mean keeping them out of harms way unless the mission is absolutely necessary. Iraq never was, nor now is, a mission that is absolutely necessary. And the fact is, nobody even knows what the hell the mission is anymore.  Iraq is not worth to the United States the horrible price that is being extracted from our soldiers. You want to support the troops? Get them the hell out of Iraq- now. Tell Mr Bush to stop pissing away our military in this bullshit war of his.

"Support The Troops"
Republican Fundies:  "Support The Troops"  to Fundy word twisters means sending even more of them into the meatgrinder of Iraq to die or get maimed.
Democrats: "Support The Troops" means keeping them OUT OF Iraq in the first place to prevent their being killed or maimed.
Question:  Who REALLY  "supports the troops"????

Bill Maher Commenting on George Bush 

Bill Maher, commenting on George Bush

Emboldening The Terrorists 

Barney Fife says:  "Bush can do no wrong! So, whatEVER Bush did, even break the law and bragging about it, well,  it must have been the right thing to do, 'cause Bush can do no wrong!"

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"I believe the government that governs best is the government that governs least,
 and by these standards we have set up a fabulous government in Iraq."
-Steven Colbert 4/29/06   White House Correspondents Association dinner

I really do believe this man will go down as the worst president this country has ever had. 
(Senator Harry Reid, Nevada. The New York Times National Edition, 3/17/06 p. A19)

"Bush Mourns the Fallen, Vows to Create  More"  -Mark Smith, 11-27-05

"Let Iraqis stand up for Iraq." -Senator John Kerry, 11/18/05

"You don't call John Murtha a coward. … I mean, Dick Cheney had five deferments in a row in Vietnam, when John Murtha went to serve."  -Senator John Kerry, 11/18/05

"I like guys who've never been (to war) that criticize us who've been there. I like that. I like guys who got five deferments (i.e. Vice President Dick Cheney) and never been there and send people to war, and then don't like to hear suggestions about what needs to be done."  -Congressman John Murtha 11/16/05

----------------------------------------------------

  "Emboldening & Encouraging The Terrorists" 

  "Bring it on!!!" G.W. Bush

Thanks to George W. Bush's childish taunt inviting Terrorists world-wide to come to Iraq and kill Americans, they have been doing so now by the thousands. Brave but inept George is good at starting fights that others have to finish, while he himself, Mr. "Avoid Vietnam via National Guard" sits backs and enjoys the mayhem from his easy chair safe in the White House. No one- I repeat: NO ONE has "emboldened" or "encouraged" the terrorists more than George himself with this stupid and totally irresponsible taunt. Has any, ANYone, in this country, made a personal and VERY public invitation to all the Terrorists of the world to come and kill American soldiers in Iraq? Has Cindy Sheehan? John Kerry? Michael Moore? If anyone is looking for grounds for impeachment, here it is, for thanks to George's personal invitation, terrorists from throughout the entire world have flocked to Iraq and put over 2,125 Americans into body bags and blown arms and legs and other body parts (think tits & dicks) off another 15,000 sons & daughters. "Emboldening The Terrorists"??? That's you, George, you fucking dumbass.  Some of the other stupid things George has done that have aided, abetted and "emboldened" the enemy (aren't those crimes???) are the following}

• Disbanding the Iraqi army and stiffing them on their pensions. RESULTS:      400,000 pissed-off well-armed & trained "I hate Americans!" unemployed soldiers.

• Allowing unrestrained looting to go on for a month after our invasion. RESULTS:   All criminal records & government organization were destroyed.

• Allowing Terrorists to empty out Saddam's arsenals and ammo dumps. RESULTS:   That ammunition is now used in over 700 attacks PER DAY in Iraq.

• Not ever putting enough American troops in to get the job done. RESULTS:   Always having to go back and recapture the same areas: Fallujah- 4 times already.

• Torture of prisoners, and desecration of the Koran. RESULTS:    Terrorists count this as their #1 recruiting tool to sign people up worldwide to fight against us.

• Forcing American troops to drive around Iraq in under-armored Humvees and totally UN-armored trucks rather than using helicopters.  RESULTS:    Lots of target practice for the bad guys, and 15,000 fucked-up Americans.

Brokeback Mountain II

Watch the love story of all time- how a tough go-it-alone Texan cowboy stands up to flag-waving yahoo's and sells our national ports (and sells out our national security) to his middle eastern lover, and also allows the price of gasoline to double and triple, making his rich Arabian lover even richer. And watch how he continues to fool the yokels into thinking he's still a macho American cowboy with only their best interests at heart, yet gasoline stays above $3 a gallon. See "Brokeback Mountain II" playing in real life (or a gas station) near you!  

AN_APOLOGY_FROM_A_BUSH_VOTER

AN APOLOGY FROM A BUSH VOTER    Monday, May 8th, 2006

By Doug McIntyre / Host, McIntyre in the Morning Talk Radio 790 KABC

There’s nothing harder in public life than admitting you’re wrong. By the way, admitting you’re wrong can be even tougher in private life. If you don’t believe me, just ask Bill Clinton or Charlie Sheen. But when you go out on the limb in public, it’s out there where everyone can see it, or in my case, hear it.

So, I’m saying today, I was wrong to have voted for George W. Bush. In historic terms, I believe George W. Bush is the worst two-term President in the history of the country. Worse than Grant. I also believe a case can be made that he’s the worst President, period.

In 2000, I was a McCain guy. I wasn’t sure about the Texas Governor. He had name recognition and a lot of money behind him, but other than that? What? Still, I was sick of all the Clinton shenanigans and the thought of President Gore was… unthinkable. So, GWB became my guy.

For the first few months he was just flubbing along like most new Presidents, no great shakes, but no disasters either. He cut taxes and I like tax cuts.

Then September 11th happened. September 11th changed everything for me, like it did for so many of you. After September 11th, all the intramural idiocy of American politics stopped being funny. We had been attacked by a vicious and determined enemy and it was time for all of us to row in the same direction.

And we did for the blink of an eye. I believed the President when he said we were going to hunt down Bin Laden and all those responsible for the 9-11 murders. I believed President Bush when he said we would go after the terrorists and the nations that harbored them.

I supported the President when he sent our troops into Afghanistan, after all, that’s where the Taliban was, that’s where al-Qaida trained the killers, that’s where Bin Laden was.

And I cheered when we quickly toppled the Taliban government, but winced when we let Bin Laden escape from Tora-Bora.

Then, the talk turned to Iraq and I winced again.

I thought the connection to 9-11 was sketchy at best. But Colin Powell impressed me at the UN, and Tony Blair was in, and after all, he was a Clinton guy, not a Bush guy, so I thought the case had to be strong. I was worried though, because I had read the Wolfowitz paper, “The Project for the New American Century.” It’s been around since ‘92, and it raised alarm bells because it was based on a theory, “Democratizing the Middle East” and I prefer pragmatism over theory. I was worried because Iraq was being justified on a radical new basis, “pre-emptive war.” Any time we do something without historical precedent I get nervous.

But the President shifted the argument to WMDs and the urgent threat of Iraq getting atomic weapons. The debate turned to Saddam passing nukes on to terror groups. After 9-11, the risk was too great. As the President said, “The next smoking gun might be a mushroom cloud.” At least that’s what I thought at the time.

I grew up in New York and watched them build the World Trade Center. I worked with a guy, Frank O’Brien, who put the elevators in both towers. I lost a very close friend on September 11th. 103 floor, tower one, Cantor Fitzgerald. Tim Coughlin was his name. If we had to take out Iraq to make sure something like that, or worse, never happened again, so be it. I knew the consequences. We have a soldier in our house. None of this was theoretical in my house.

But in the months and years since shock and awe I have been shocked repeatedly by a consistent litany of excuses, alibis, double-talk, inaccuracies, bogus predictions, and flat out lies. I have watched as the President and his administration changed the goals, redefined the reasons for going into Iraq, and fumbled the good will of the world and the focus necessary to catch the real killers of September 11th.

I have watched the President say the commanders on the ground will make the battlefield decisions, and the war won’t be run from Washington. Yet, politics has consistently determined what the troops can and can’t do on the ground and any commander who did not go along with the administration was sacked, and in some cases, maligned.

I watched and tried to justify the looting in Iraq after the fall of Saddam. I watched and tried to justify the dismantling of the entire Iraqi army. I tired to explain the complexities of building a functional new Iraqi army. I urged patience when no WMDs were found. Then the Vice President told us we were in the “waning days of the insurgency.” And I started wincing again. The President says we have to stay the course but what if it’s the wrong course?

It was the wrong course. All of it was wrong. We are not on the road to victory. We’re about to slink home with our tail between our legs, leaving civil war in Iraq and a nuclear armed Iran in our wake. Bali was bombed. Madrid was bombed. London was bombed. And Bin Laden is still making tapes. It’s unspeakable. The liberal media didn’t create this reality, bad policy did.

Most historians believe it takes 30-50 years before we get a reasonably accurate take on a President’s place in history. So, maybe 50 years from now Iraq will be a peaceful member of the brotherhood of nations and George W. Bush will be celebrated as a visionary genius.

But we don’t live fifty years in the future. We live now. We have to make public policy decisions now. We have to live with the consequences of the votes we cast and the leaders we chose now.

After five years of carefully watching George W. Bush I’ve reached the conclusion he’s either grossly incompetent, or a hand puppet for a gaggle of detached theorists with their own private view of how the world works. Or both.

Presidential failures. James Buchanan, Franklin Pierce, Jimmy Carter, Warren Harding — the competition is fierce for the worst of the worst. Still, the damage this President has done is enormous. It will take decades to undo, and that’s assuming we do everything right from now on. His mistakes have global implications, while the other failed Presidents mostly authored domestic embarrassments.

And speaking of domestic embarrassments, let’s talk for a minute about President Bush’s domestic record. Yes, he cut taxes. But tax cuts combined with reckless spending and borrowing is criminal mismanagement of the public’s money. We’re drunk at the mall with our great grandchildren’s credit cards. Whatever happened to the party of fiscal responsibility?

Bush created a giant new entitlement, the prescription drug plan. He lied to his own party to get it passed. He lied to the country about its true cost. It was written by and for the pharmaceutical industry. It helps nobody except the multinationals that lobbied for it. So much for smaller government. In fact, virtually every tentacle of government has grown exponentially under Bush. Unless, of course, it was an agency to look after the public interest, or environmental protection, and/or worker’s rights.

I’ve talked so often about the border issue, I won’t bore you with a rehash. It’s enough to say this President has been a catastrophe for the wages of working people; he’s debased the work ethic itself. “Jobs Americans won’t do!” He doesn’t believe in the sovereign borders of the country he’s sworn to protect and defend. And his devotion to cheap labor for his corporate benefactors, along with his worship of multinational trade deals, makes an utter mockery of homeland security in a post 9-11 world. The President’s January 7th, 2004 speech on immigration, his first trial balloon on his guest worker scheme, was a deal breaker for me. I couldn’t and didn’t vote for him in 2004. And I’m glad I didn’t.

Katrina, Harriet Myers, The Dubai Port Deal, skyrocketing gas prices, shrinking wages for working people, staggering debt, astronomical foreign debt, outsourcing, open borders, contempt for the opinion of the American people, the war on science, media manipulation, faith based initives, a cavalier attitude toward fundamental freedoms-- this President has run the most arrogant and out-of-touch administration in my lifetime, perhaps, in any American’s lifetime.

You can make a case that Abraham Lincoln did what he had to do, the public be damned. If you roll the dice on your gut and you’re right, history remembers you well. But, when your gut led you from one business failure to another, when your gut told you to trade Sammy Sosa to the Cubs, and you use the same gut to send our sons and daughters to fight and die in a distraction from the real war on terror, then history will and should be unapologetic in its condemnation.

None of this, by the way, should be interpreted as an endorsement of the opposition party. The Democrats are equally bankrupt. This is the second crime of our age. Again, historically speaking, its times like these when America needs a vibrant opposition to check the power of a run-amuck majority party. It requires it. It doesn’t work without one. Like the high and low tides keep the oceans alive, a healthy, positive opposition offers a path back to the center where all healthy societies live.

Tragically, the Democrats have allowed crackpots, leftists and demagogic cowards to snipe from the sidelines while taking no responsibility for anything. In fairness, I don’t believe a Democrat president would have gone into Iraq. Unfortunately, I don’t know if President Gore would have gone into Afghanistan. And that’s one of the many problems with the Democrats.

The two party system has always been clumsy and imperfect, but it has only collapsed once, in the 1850s, and the result was civil war.

I believe, as I have said countless times, the two party system is on the brink of a second collapsed. It’s currently running on spin, anger, revenge, and pots and pots and pots of money.

We’re being governed by paper-mache patriots; brightly painted red, white and blue, but hollow to the core. Both parties have mastered the cynical arts of media manipulation and fund raising. They’ve learned the lessons of Watergate and burn the tapes. They have learned to divide the nation for their own gain. They have demonstrated the willingness to exploit any tragedy for personal advantage. The contempt they have for the American people is without parallel.

This is painful to say, and I’m sure for many of you, painful to read. But it’s impossible to heal the country until we’re willing to acknowledge the truth no matter how painful. We have to wean ourselves off sugar coated partisan lies.

With a belated tip of the cap to Ralph Nader, the system is broken, so broken, it’s almost inevitable it pukes up the Al Gores and George W. Bushes. Where are the Trumans and the Eisenhowers? Where are the men and women of vision and accomplishment? Why do we have to settle for recycled hacks and malleable ciphers? Greatness is always rare, but is basic competence and simple honesty too much to ask?

It may be decades before we have the full picture of how paranoid and contemptuous this administration has been. And I am open to the possibility that I’m all wet about everything I’ve just said. But I’m putting it out there, because I have to call it as I see it, and this is how I see it today. I don’t say any of this lightly. I’ve thought about this for months and months. But eventually, the weight of evidence takes on a gravitational force of its own.

I believe that George W. Bush has taken us down a terrible road. I don’t believe the Democrats are offering an alternative. That means we’re on our own to save this magnificent country. The United States of America is a gift to the world, but it has been badly abused and it’s rightful owners, We the People, had better step up to the plate and reclaim it before the damage becomes irreparable.

So, accept my apology for allowing partisanship to blind me to an obvious truth; our President is incapable of the tasks he is charged with. I almost feel sorry for him. He is clearly in over his head. Yet, he doesn’t generate the sympathy Warren Harding earned. Harding, a spectacular mediocrity, had the self-knowledge to tell any and all he shouldn’t be President. George W. Bush continues to act the part, but at this point whose buying the act?

Does this make me a waffler? A flip-flopper? Maybe, although I prefer to call it realism. And, for those of you who never supported Bush, its also fair to accuse me of kicking Bush while he’s down. After all, you were kicking him while he was up.

You were right, I was wrong.

DEMONcrats 

"Demoncrats"??? They have no convictions!!! They have no principles!!!       -ReFundican Sen. Bill Frist,  Nov 1, 2005 Sound familiar to all you Atheists out there? It should. You hear these lies and slander all the time from good and holy Christians, who have decided that lying and slandering are no longer sins like Paul said.  Yes, the usual smears and LIES that Fundy Christians used to reserve only for us Atheists are now being re-tooled for use against half of the entire county-  the Democrats. Yes, now for anyone to have morals and goodness and convictions and principles you must first of all be a ReFundican!!! ReFundicans are now the ONLY good people left in the world.  If you're NOT a ReFundican, then you're an Attila the Hun "without convictions" and "without principles" burning and raping as you rampage down the boulevard. Hypocritical Republican Fundy Senator Frist bemoans the fact that Democrats "have no convictions", unlike his own party and himself, which, with the indictments and charges handed down, will soon have lots of convictions! Enjoy jail, Mr. Frist!!! Thought Question:  If Christians were really defending the truth, would the truth use lies and deceptions to defend itself with??? Garbage In, Garbage Out      Pres. Bush is accusing the Demoncrats with a, "They wanted the war too!!!" whine. What he's failing to mention is that the reasons congress wanted the war had all been supplied by Bush & Co, and were all deliberate lies at worse, or "cherry picked", that is, taken out of context, at best. In other words, garbage. And Bush knew they were garbage, but fed it to congress anyway. So don't blame congress. All they knew was what Bush told them, and if they are guilty, they're only guilty of trusting Pres. Bush. Like I said, Garbage In, Garbage Out.

Drive Out The Bush Regime

Your government, on the basis of outrageous lies, is waging a murderous and utterly illegitimate war in Iraq, with other countries in their sights.

Your government is openly torturing people, and justifying it.

Your government puts people in jail on the merest suspicion, refusing them lawyers, and either holding them indefinitely or deporting them in the dead of night.

Your government is moving each day closer to a theocracy, where a narrow and hateful brand of Christian fundamentalism will rule.

Your government suppresses the science that doesn't fit its religious, political and economic agenda, forcing present and future generations to pay a terrible price.

Your government is moving to deny women here, and all over the world, the right to birth control and abortion.

Your government enforces a culture of greed, bigotry, intolerance and ignorance.

People look at all this and think of Hitler — and they are right to do so. The Bush regime is setting out to radically remake society very quickly, in a fascist way, and for generations to come. We must act now; the future is in the balance.

Memo On Torture From:  Alberto Gonzales            Att'y General for Herr Bush To:      All Department Heads Re:      New Torture Guidelines
When OK	Type of Torture
Mondays Wednesdays Fridays
Tuesdays Wednesdays
Weekends Holidays Bush's Birthday

"Lied Into War"

"Why doesn't someone ask Bush why the story line
 for why we invaded Iraq has changed so many times?"

• Endless "Whack The Gopher" Arcade Game      There are NOT enough American troops to hold the territory they fight and die for. They invade a city, chase the Islamic Party Poopers out of the city, then leave the city after a week or so, and the bad guys move right back in. From the L.A. Times (10/5/05 p. A3) "The offensive... brought Marines BACK to Haditha... two months AFTER driving insurgents out of the area. US forces suffered heavy looses in that early August assault: 14 Marines died when an armored vehicle hit a landmine. DAYS AFTER American forces left, however, militants were BACK IN CONTROL, dominating a region of 100,000 people with no... police force."  So tell me, Bushies, just WHAT THE FUCK did those 14 Marines die for back in August, when you GAVE THE CITY BACK to the bad guys just to be RE-taken by us in October??? Are you going to tell their grieving families that, "yes, your only son died so that Haditha could be free of terrorists... for a whole 3 days." Those 14 Marines THREW THEIR LIVES AWAY FOR N-O-T-H-I-N-G.  Nothing.  A total and complete WASTE OF HUMAN LIFE, thanks to George Bush's lack of planning and stubborness.

• Do The Math:  We'll Be There Forever      On "Meet The Press" today (Oct 2, 2005) it was mentioned that the Iraqi battalions that are able to stand on their own- without U.S. forces- has decreased from three in July to just one now. And as it will take about 140 of these battalions of Iraqis to replace the U.S. forces there, and as its taken (so far) two and one half YEARS just to end up with ONE (which may or may not "disappear"), doing the math... that means that America will have thousands of soldiers dying each year in Iraq for another 347 years, up into the year 2352 AD. But Bush calls for "patience". Patience, my ass!

• Going Backwards = "Moving Forward!"       Also mentioned on Meet The Press (Oct 2, 2005), but with no apparent outrage, is just WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED TO 2/3^rds OF THE IRAQI BATTALIONS SINCE THE MIDDLE OF SUMMER??? This is what Bush called "progress" in his national radio address yesterday-  progress to him is 2/3^rds of Iraqi battalions "disappearing" into thin air, and this moving BACKWARDS Bush calls "moving forward"!!! Is Bush at ALL in touch with reality, or has drinking got him living in la la land????

• 500 Attacks EVERY DAY      Meet The Press, (Oct 2, 2005), also mentioned the number of daily attacks by the Muslim party poopers is averaging FIVE HUNDRED- that's right, 500, each and every day. Compare this  number to the two or three a day acknowledged on FOX or CBS etc news. Yeah, George, that's REAL progress- IF you're an insurgent!

• Honor The Dead With Even More Dead?      Bush says the reason he can't pull out of Iraq is "to honor the soldiers who have already died". Let me translate that into plain English, so all can see the absurdity of it:  he want to "honor the soldiers who have already died" with even more dead soldiers, as the only way to properly honor a mistake of this magnitude... is by increasing the magnitude of the mistake!  As there will never come a time when he WON'T want to "honor the soldiers who have already died" there will therefore also never come a time when he can pull the troops out. Therefore, to the already huge stack of dead rotting American corpses he intends to keep adding even more dead rotting American corpses, world without end.

• How Many Dead So Far?     Imagine a typical bedroom 10' x 10' with an 8' ceiling. Now imagine it jam packed with dead stinking rotting American corpses sent home from Iraq, crammed in from floor to ceiling. It can hold about 90 bodies. Now imagine 21 of these bedrooms stacked up vertically- to the height of a 21 story building. That's how many he's gotten killed so far, as of Sept 2005. And he wants it even higher, to "honor those who have already died". This from the man who broke the record for death row inmates executed while he was governor of Texas. Pro-life my ass!

• Just Like Our War With Japan?     San Diego, CA}   In a speech Tuesday, August 30, 2005, Presidunce Bush, according to news sources,  "sought to cast the conflict [in Iraq] as the modern day equivalent of America's World War Two struggle against Japan, which ended 60 years ago this month." What Presidunce Bush conveniently left out were THE two glaring giant humongous differences, the differences that makes ALL the difference: JAPAN ATTACKED US, IRAQ DID NOT.   And that Japan was the aggressor then, WE are the aggressor NOW. And therefore, whatever moral guilt Japan is painted with for STARTING that war, we are ourselves JUST AS GUILTY NOW. (NOTE: While Bush was giving this speech to his rich friends to drum up $$$ for the Republican party, thousands of poor blacks were drowning in New Orleans for lack of being rescued.)

• Dying for WHAT Country?     American soldiers in Iraq aren't  "dying for their country" or "defending America"; they're dying for Iraq, and who, deep down inside, really gives a shit about Iraq- enough to die or get maimed for it, except maybe the people stuck living there, and alot of them don't seem too crazy about it either. Do YOU, my reader, give enough of a shit about, say, Outer Slobovia, enough to go DIE or get MAIMED FOR LIFE trying to improve it? Is THEIR happiness worth YOUR misery? How about Timbuktu? Would you sacrifice your son's life if it improved Baghdad's sewer system? Is THIS the new American foreign policy, to sacrifice endless quantities of American troops in every fucked up place in the world trying to unfuck them until we go broke and/or bleed ourselves to death?  Is a fucking SEWER SYSTEM the "noble cause" Bush keeps saying our troops are dying for?

• "Embolden the Terrorists"     What a STUPID dittohead "talking point". How is announcing a time schedule supposed to "Embolden the terrorists"??? They're already "embolden enough" to blow themselves up to kingdom come. Maybe Bush would like to explain just what the hell can possibly be more bold than that? You really want to "embolden the terrorists"??? How about having the President of the United States swagger up to the microphone and challenge all the terrorists of the world to "Bring it on!!!" How's THAT for "emboldening the terrorists"? As for setting a date, IF John Doe Terrorist knew that America was going to withdraw, say, tomorrow, do you think he'd blow himself up TODAY to make America withdraw? If anything, setting a date would cause LESS terrorism, NOT more.

•  "Aiding & Helping the Terrorists"     Another stupid dittohead slogan. Let me show you why it's soooo damn stupid} The terrorists have moved TO Iraq BECAUSE President Chickenhawk INVITED THEM THERE, and not because of Cindy Sheehan or any anti-war movement!!! It was Bush, not Cindy, who issued the insane "Bring it on!!!" challenge to terrorists worldwide. Well, they HAVE "brought it on", just like our idiot President wanted.  Now once all these terrorists get to Iraq (because, after all, they were INVITED there, remember?) they then STAY IN IRAQ because it gives them opportunity to practice target shooting, with your sons and daughters being the sitting ducks. Therefore, if and when the Americans LEAVE Iraq, the terrorists will ALSO leave Iraq, as they'll no longer have a reason to BE in Iraq, the same as if you removed all the deer from a forest, the deer hunters will also leave. Therefore all you pro-war people, you want to "aid and help the terrorists"??? Keep the troops in.

• As Moral as Hitler     What is the big moral difference between Bush taking over Iraq based on a bunch of lies, and Hitler taking over Poland based on a bunch of lies?

• Cindy Sheehan     Secret Memo from Karl Rove to all Republican Lapdogs}   "Attack Cindy Sheehan! Kill the messenger! Attack the messenger! Attack! Attack! Attack! Drown out what she's trying to say and just attack her personally. Make fun of her, mock her, insult her, SWIFT BOAT HER ASS!!! Do whatever you WANT with her, even run over her crosses, scream at her or shoot her- just for God's sake don't LISTEN to her or try to answer her questions. Remember, she is ANTI-War and a peacemaker and it's a lie that Jesus ever said "Blessed are the peacemakers". We Republicans are PRO-War, PRO-Jesus, Go Jesus, Rah!     In Jesus' blessed name, Karl"  Don't be fooled- Rove is the one hiding backstage pulling the strings of Limbaugh, Hannity, and all the rest of the right-wing puppets, to "swift boat" Cindy with a smear campaign via all these ad hominem attacks. Ad hominem attacks  "are a fallacy in which a claim is rejected on the basis of some irrelevant fact about the the person presenting the claim."  This means, all the personal attacks they are making against her carry as much intellectual weight as "Of course Cindy is wrong! After all, she's got blond hair!" After all the Christian slandering and gossip is done, this fact remains steadfast and unmoved: Cindy's son DIED FOR A LIE, a lie that originated from the good Christian LIAR George W. Bush, and she just wants  that good Christian to grow enough BALLS to fess up to it! What's so fucking out of line about THAT??? Bush has the "swagger", now let the spoiled rich kid grow the BALLS to match that fake ass swagger and for the first time since he was elected President face something other than a hand-picked censored "We love you George!" kiss-ass Fundy Christian audience. Can "macho" George face-off with an angry mom? I doubt it. George has always been a pussy, from skipping out on finishing his National Guard duty, to having a total melt-down during the debates with Kerry, and to only appearing before audiences who have to sign a fucking LOYALTY OATH just to get in the door. Pussy. Big time pussy. Bush is to macho as Henry Winkler is to Fonzy on Happy Days.

• "Stay the Course"     Over 50,000 American lives were totally wasted in Vietnam "staying the course" before we finally got the hell out. Now, how many American lives will be flushed down the Iraqi toilet by recycling that same stupid 1960's "stay the course" slogan? Vietnam went communist, and Iraq is already falling apart in bloody civil war, so what lasting good will our having "stayed the course" in either hell-hole have done? Let me repeat myself: 50,000 Americans paid the ultimate price in Vietnam because of a mule-headed stubborn-ass president. What good lasting thing was bought with all those lives spent? NOTHING. Vietnam is today the same as if we had never gone in, except that 50,000 Americans came home in body bags. Likewise in Iraq, all that's going to happen is to have gotten a whole lot of Americans killed and fucked up for life for no good reason and the country will end up as it was before we got there: fucked up, and probably worse so. Thank you George, you fucking moron. Only a stubborn fool would "stay the course" when said "course" is taking him straight into a brick wall at 100 mph.

"Stay, uhhh, the course!  And, uhhh, icknore that wall uphead! Jezzus talks 2 me so me perfek- no musteaks- ebber!"

Read all about the melt down at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenne}    http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/article_7483.shtml

--Bush Family Values-- We've Heard the Rhetoric, Bring On The Reality!!! "A good tree *cannot produce bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot produce good fruit. You can tell what a tree is like by the fruit it produces. You cannot pick figs or grapes from thornBUSHes. Good people do good things because of the good in their hearts. Bad people do bad things because of the evil in their hearts." (Jesus Christ, The Gospel of Luke 6:43-45  Contemporary English Version) *Christians- what part of "CANNOT" don't you understand???
Jenna Bush Arrested! Arrested! Arrested! *Underage Drinking & Buying Booze as a Kid     A real "chip off the old block". Party on Jenna Bush! Who knows? Maybe if you follow in your dad's footsteps-  avoid going to combat and don't stop drinking until you hit 40- you too can become President! So "bring it on!!!" (more booze that is) *12/31/97, 4/27/01, 5/31/01	Arrested! *Drunk Driving   ...and now thanks to  Fundys he's driving our country!!! -AND- drinking again!!!   *Kennebunkport, Maine Sept. 4, 1976 For more on Bush's re-addiction to alcohol see: The Rant by Doug Thompson	Barbara Bush Arrested! *Trying to Buy Booze as a Kid     Party on Barbara Bush! Party on with your two good legs and arms! Don't let your father getting 14,000+ of your fellow Americans maimed for life in Iraq slow you down none. Yeee-haaa! *5/31/01

Arrested! Just another apple falling not far from the tree. (Christians- do you remember something about Jesus saying "By their fruits ye shall know them... a good tree (or Bush) can not produce bad fruit."??? Is that still valid, or has Pope Pat Robertson removed it from the Bible???	Arrested! Party-Hardy Noelle was arrested for trying to obtain Xanax, a "parachute drug" used by druggies trying to "get down" from the highs of the club drug ecstasy.
IF the Bush "Tree" were truly good THEN it wouldn't be producing all this BAD fruit. Either Bush & Clan are real STINKERS -or- Jesus LIED about good trees and their fruit.

Terror Alert Prediction

(Wednesday, Oct 26, 2005 @ 7:30 PST)   As I write this, the Indictments in the CIA leak/treason investigation case have yet to be released. They are expected shortly. But based upon past behavior of the rich spoiled brat occupying the White House, this is what I predict will follow the release:

• Terror Alert:     Within days a much publicized "Terror Alert" will be issued. Of course, there will be no REAL terror threat. This will merely be partisan politics using the whole alert system to distract people from bad news about Bush. In debate circles it's called a "red herring".

• The Prosecutor:     Within a week, stories will surface attempting to make the prosecutor look like Satan himself. He wet his bed till he was eight; he played hooky in 9th grade, whatever. It will be Karl Adolf Rove attacking- attacking & destroying being the only strategy he seems to know.

Will I be right, or will I be wrong? We shall see...
UPDATE: The indictments came out Friday. The countdown begins...

BZZZT!!!  Right on the money... A new TERROR ALERT came out Tuesday, Nov. 1st, but was mostly IGNORED by the media because the lying sacks of shit (all good Christians, by the way) running ruining this government have too often cried "The sky is falling!!!" for anybody to take these bullshit "Terror Alerts" serious anymore.

Set Free... of George Bush
"Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free" John 8:32
 

  Truth:  Bush & Co. lied us into a frivolous war 
"What the White House has to fear is a trial... where all the secrets of
what was done to stampede us into war come spilling out. This case...
could also become about whether we were
lied into a war General Odom calls the
 'greatest strategic disaster in the history
of the United States.'"  *Pat Buchanan 10/20/05

  Truth:  Bush & Co. attack Americans for telling the truth about their frivolous war 
"When Joe Wilson told the truth, the Administration's reaction was to attack him,
attack his wife, and attack Iraq. That's the real crime here, whether (or not)
Rove, Libby, or anyone else is indicted."  
*Bob Shrum, 10/17/05

  Truth:  Starting frivolous wars is a crime against humanity 
Former dictator Saddam Hussein is currently on trial for his life, in a Baghdad courtroom. He is on trial for horrendous crimes. One of those crimes he is accused of, and may pay with his life for, is EXACTLY the same thing George W. Bush did:  starting frivolous wars for no good reason in which hundreds and hundreds of his own soldiers have died. What I want to know is this: if it is a crime- a horrific crime- a crime beyond the pale- for Saddam Hussein to have done this, why is not similarly a crime for the drunk from Texas? What hypocritical double standard has Saddam on trial for his life while our own version of Saddam struts around free???

"The chief prosecutor, Jaafar Mousawi... gave an overview of... Hussein's horrific crimes. Two million Iraqis, he said, were killed in unreasonable wars against Iran and Kuwait" **
Hussein 4Unreasonable War 4Two Million Killed	Bush 4Unreasonable War 4Two Thousand Killed
Other than the numbers, what's the damn difference???   Truth:  Starting frivolous wars is a crime  WHY ISN'T BUSH IN JAIL AWAITING HIS OWN TRIAL??? "Americans are tired of investigations and scandal, and the best way to get rid of them is to elect a new president who will bring a new administration, who will restore honor and dignity to the White House." [Then-Governor George Bush on CNN's "Burden of Proof," 9/15/00]

 *  http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9601200/#051019a
**  L.A. Times, 10/10/05  p. A-11

Expect a Stupid President to do Stupid Things

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, who was Colin Powell's right-hand man for 16 years, and the former director of the U.S. Marine Corp War College at Quantico, had these comments at a policy forum at The New America Foundation on 10/19/05}

Cheney & Bush Are In It For The Money:
The "Cheney-Rumsfeld cabal" is influenced by the business world and that Cheney was a member of the "military industrial complex." "How much influence on their decisions? I think a lot -- in how much the decisions reflect their connections with the cartels and the corporations and so forth, I think a lot. I think the president, too....Don Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney, from the business world – how much influence on their decisions? I think a lot – in how much the decisions reflect their connections with the cartels and the corporations and so forth, I think a lot. I think the president, too. You bring this sort of idea that the bottom line is everything.

Bush is Ignorant & Apathetic of Foreign Affairs:
"You've got a president who is not versed in international relations and not too much interested in them either."

Disaster in Iraq / Idiots Running the Government
And I would say that we have courted disaster in Iraq, in North Korea, in Iran. Generally with regard to domestic crises like Katrina, Rita – and I could go on back – we haven’t done very well on anything like that in a long time. And if something comes along that is truly serious, truly serious, something like a nuclear weapon going off in a major American city, or something like a major pandemic, you are going to see the ineptitude of this government in a way that will take you back to the Declaration of Independence. Read it sometimes again. I just use it for a tutoring class for my students down in the District of Columbia. It forced me to read it really closely because we’re doing metaphors and similes and antonyms and synonyms and so forth, and read in there what the founders say in a very different language than we use today. Read in there what they say about the necessity of the people to throw off tyranny or to throw off ineptitude or to throw off that which is not doing what the people want it to do. And you’re talking about the potential for, I think, real dangerous times if we don’t get our act together.

Stupid People Put In Charge
Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, whom most of you probably know Tommy Franks said was the stupidest blankety, blank man in the world. He was. (Laughter.) Let me testify to that. He was. Seldom in my life have I met a dumber man. (Laughter.) And yet – and yet – and yet, after the secretary of State agrees to a $40 billion department rather than a $30 billion department having control, at least in the immediate post-war period in Iraq, this man is put in charge. Not only is he put in charge, he is given carte blanche to tell the State Department to go screw itself in a closet somewhere.

Bush is Destroying The U.S. Army
We may have to do that anyway because my army right now is truly in bad shape – truly in bad shape. And I’m not talking about the billions and billions of dollars of equipment it’s burning up in Iraq at a rate 10 or 15 times the rate its life cycle said it should be burned up at, but I’m also talking about when you have officers who have to hedge the truth, NCOs who have to hedge the truth. They start voting with their feet, as they did in Vietnam, my war. They come home and they tell their wife they’ve got to go back for the third tour and the fourth tour and the wife says, uh-uh, or the husband says, uh-uh, and all of a sudden your military begins to unravel. And the signs are very concrete right now that the Army and the Marine Corps – to a lesser extent the other services because they’re not quite as involved in the deployments that we’re talking about here and the frequency thereof, the op tempo as we say it – problems are brewing. Problems are brewing.
 

Bush is Basically Brainless
Kim Campbell, the former prime minister (of Canada), at the panel we had, she said, we’re not anti-American, we’re scared; we’re scared to death the giant has no head. You’re in the world and you have no head.

Bush is an Undiplomatic Brute & Bully
I like to use the world gracelessness, and I use that word because grace is something we have lost in the modern world. It’s a very important product. It’s very different, for example, to walk in with a foreign leader and find something you can be magnanimous about. You don’t have to win everything. You don’t have to be the big bully on the block. Find something you can be magnanimous about, that you can give him, that you can say he gets credit for, or she gets credit for. That’s diplomacy. That’s diplomacy. You don’t walk in and say, I’m the big mother on the block and if everybody’s not with me, they’re against me, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. The difference between father and son, in my mind, sort of comes from that attitudinal approach to the world.

Bush Has Destroyed 50 Years of Diplomacy
So if you’re unilaterally declaring Kyoto dead, if you’re declaring the Geneva Convention is not operative, if you’re doing a host of things that the world doesn’t agree with you on and you’re doing them blatantly and in their face – as I said before, without grace – then you’ve got to pay the consequences, and the consequences are your public diplomacy people have a really tough job. And is Karen Hughes going to turn it around? I pray for her every night.

For a transcript of his entire speech, go to}

http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/Wilkerson%20Speech%20--%20WEB.htm

A Letter to All Who Voted for George W. Bush

Michael Moore,  Sunday, September 11th, 2005

To All My Fellow Americans Who Voted for George W. Bush:

On this, the fourth anniversary of 9/11, I'm just curious, how does it feel?

How does it feel to know that the man you elected to lead us after we were attacked went ahead and put a guy in charge of FEMA whose main qualification was that he ran horse shows?

That's right. Horse shows.

I really want to know -- and I ask you this in all sincerity and with all due respect -- how do you feel about the utter contempt Mr. Bush has shown for your safety? C'mon, give me just a moment of honesty. Don't start ranting on about how this disaster in New Orleans was the fault of one of the poorest cities in America. Put aside your hatred of Democrats and liberals and anyone with the last name of Clinton. Just look me in the eye and tell me our President did the right thing after 9/11 by naming a horse show runner as the top man to protect us in case of an emergency or catastrophe.

I want you to put aside your self-affixed label of Republican/conservative/born-again/capitalist/ditto-head/right-winger and just talk to me as an American, on the common ground we both call America.

Are we safer now than before 9/11? When you learn that behind the horse show runner, the #2 and #3 men in charge of emergency preparedness have zero experience in emergency preparedness, do you think we are safer?

When you look at Michael Chertoff, the head of Homeland Security, a man with little experience in national security, do you feel secure?

When men who never served in the military and have never seen young men die in battle send our young people off to war, do you think they know how to conduct a war? Do they know what it means to have your legs blown off for a threat that was never there?

Do you really believe that turning over important government services to private corporations has resulted in better services for the people?

Why do you hate our federal government so much? You have voted for politicians for the past 25 years whose main goal has been to de-fund the federal government. Do you think that cutting federal programs like FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers has been good or bad for America? GOOD OR BAD?

With the nation's debt at an all-time high, do you think tax cuts for the rich are still a good idea? Will you give yours back so hundreds of thousands of homeless in New Orleans can have a home?

Do you believe in Jesus? Really? Didn't he say that we would be judged by how we treat the least among us? Hurricane Katrina came in and blew off the facade that we were a nation with liberty and justice for all. The wind howled and the water rose and what was revealed was that the poor in America shall be left to suffer and die while the President of the United States fiddles and tells them to eat cake.

That's not a joke. The day the hurricane hit and the levees broke, Mr. Bush, John McCain and their rich pals were stuffing themselves with cake. A full day after the levees broke (the same levees whose repair funding he had cut), Mr. Bush was playing a guitar some country singer gave him. All this while New Orleans sank under water.

It would take ANOTHER day before the President would do a flyover in his jumbo jet, peeking out the window at the misery 2500 feet below him as he flew back to his second home in DC. It would then be TWO MORE DAYS before a trickle of federal aid and troops would arrive. This was no seven minutes in a sitting trance while children read "My Pet Goat" to him. This was FOUR DAYS of doing nothing other than saying "Brownie (FEMA director Michael Brown), you're doing a heck of a job!"

My Republican friends, does it bother you that we are the laughing stock of the world?

And on this sacred day of remembrance, do you think we honor or shame those who died on 9/11/01? If we learned nothing and find ourselves today every bit as vulnerable and unprepared as we were on that bright sunny morning, then did the 3,000 die in vain?

Our vulnerability is not just about dealing with terrorists or natural disasters. We are vulnerable and unsafe because we allow one in eight Americans to live in horrible poverty. We accept an education system where one in six children never graduate and most of those who do can't string a coherent sentence together. The middle class can't pay the mortgage or the hospital bills and 45 million have no health coverage whatsoever.

Are we safe? Do you really feel safe? You can only move so far out and build so many gated communities before the fruit of what you've sown will be crashing through your walls and demanding retribution. Do you really want to wait until that happens? Or is it your hope that if they are left alone long enough to soil themselves and shoot themselves and drown in the filth that fills the street that maybe the problem will somehow go away?

I know you know better. You gave the country and the world a man who wasn't up for the job and all he does is hire people who aren't up for the job. You did this to us, to the world, to the people of New Orleans. Please fix it. Bush is yours. And you know, for our peace and safety and security, this has to be fixed. What do you propose?

I have an idea, and it isn't a horse show.

Yours,

Michael Moore
www.michaelmoore.com
mmflint@aol.com

*************************

From the website:  http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/message/index.php?id=185
 

The Ever-Changing Storyline of WHY We Invaded Iraq

"Why doesn't someone ask Bush why the story line
 for why we invaded Iraq has changed so many times?"

• To take over the oil fields so the Terrorists couldn't. (2)

• To put "Freedom on the march!"  Iraq's democracy will shine like a beacon of hope in the Middle East and thus inspire Muslims elsewhere in the region to do likewise.

• To allow the provisional constitution to be completed.

• To allow Iraq the joy of having an American election.

• To save the world from Iraqi nuclear warheads on missiles. (And who can forget THIS classic fear-mongering line? "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud")

• To save the world from Iraqi biological attacks.

• To fight terrorists "over there" so we don't have to fight them elsewhere, like say, in London subways.

• To save us from all those weapons of mass destruction.

• To attack all those hundreds of al Qaeda bases and terrorists camps in Iraq.

• To save Israel from all those hundreds of SCUD missles hiding in Western Iraq.

• Because it would be such a "cake-walk" and the Iraqi's would welcome us with open arms.

• Because of George Bush's deep respect for the United Nations, he just couldn't stand it anymore to see Saddam ignoring U.N. Resolution 1441

• To save the Iraqi people from that awful despot.

• To punish Iraq for flying those planes into the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001  (1)

1) President Bush said:  "the battle of Iraq is one victory in a war on terror that began on September the 11th, 2001. With those attacks, the terrorists and their supporters declared war on the United States. And war is what they got."

2) President Bush in a speech at Mira Loma Naval Air Station, California, August 30, 2005

Iraqiization of the War a Total Failure

August 26th, 2005 5:38 pm
Iraqi forces may need years of preparation


By Tom Lasseter / Knight Ridder Newspapers

HIT, Iraq - (KRT) - American Sgt. LaDaunte Strickland, sweat pouring down his face, stared at the four Iraqi soldiers sitting in the shade of a truck.

They were supposed to be helping Strickland and a group of U.S. Marines man a vehicle-control point, a basic operation in which troops hope to catch insurgents at traffic stops they set up quickly on the roadsides.

"Come on. Come on! Get up," said Strickland, 30, of Cleveland, stabbing a cigar in the air to make his point. "Damn, will you PLEASE get up!"

The Iraqis didn't stir. Without an interpreter - a common occurrence - the Iraqis didn't understand Strickland, no matter how loud he got.

Three weeks of patrols and interviews in restive Anbar province suggested that Iraqi security forces will need years of preparation before they're ready to take charge of the complex and violent tribal areas of western Iraq. President Bush has said repeatedly that U.S. troops will withdraw only when Iraqi troops are ready to take over.

Many of the Iraqi troops were in poor condition, unable or unwilling to complete long foot patrols without frequent breaks. They often didn't know what to do in complicated situations, standing back and letting American Marines and soldiers take the lead.

Most of the Iraqi troops interviewed were Shiite Muslims - the majority religious group in Iraq - who were long oppressed by Sunni Muslims, Anbar's predominant ethnic group but a minority across Iraq. That history creates obstacles to establishing trust with the locals.

In Fallujah, after a U.S. assault last November routed the insurgency that had demolished the town's police force, the Interior Ministry sent in its Public Order Battalion. Residents accuse the battalion of being a de facto Shiite militia.

Marine Maj. Shaun Fitzpatrick, 36, of San Antonio said the Marines were aware of the sectarian problems and were hoping to put a predominantly Sunni police force on the streets in coming months. Until then, he said of the public-order troops, "Basically, they're Shiite and they're from Baghdad or Basra (a Shiite town). We've had problems. There are inevitable cultural clashes."

In the meantime, insurgents are attacking new police stations and intimidating contractors.

The Iraqi National Guard, heralded last year as the answer to security in the area, has been disbanded because morale was low and insurgents had infiltrated it. The old national guard trucks, with their blue emblems, now sit rusting. As with the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps, the predecessor to the national guard, American officials say the new Iraqi army and police will establish security in places such as Anbar.

However, the police force has collapsed in Ramadi, the provincial capital. Two divisions of Iraqi soldiers - a total of 12,000 men - are to establish security, but so far only 2,000 are available, and half of them lack basic training.

Hit, a city of 130,000, has no police force. North of Hit, in Haditha - near the site of attacks that killed 20 Marines this month - the police chief handed over all the patrol cars to the Marines in January.

"He said, "We can't protect these anymore,'" said Maj. Plauche St. Romain, the head intelligence officer for the Marine battalion that oversees Haditha, Haqlaniya and Hit. "He turned in the uniforms and (armor) vests, too."

That police chief was assassinated in April.

"It was pretty obvious what happened with the police. Their police stations got blown up and a lot of them were murdered," said Army Maj. William Fall, 48, of Cresson, Pa., who oversees Iraqi security-force operations in Ramadi.

Marine Capt. John LaJeunesse, who works with the police in Ramadi, said it wasn't fair to put too much blame on the police. Those who've remained to get trained and be part of the new force haven't been paid in two and a half months, he said.

So far, a little more than 5,900 police officers have been screened for all of Anbar, about half the number needed. Most of those still must be trained, said LaJeunesse, 30, of Boise, Idaho.

"The ones that stay are working without pay, and the insurgents are threatening their families," he said.

During a recent operation in Haqlaniya, a squad from the Iraqi Intervention Force, one of the more seasoned units in Iraq's army, swept through neighborhoods looking for insurgents. One of the soldiers was so overweight that he had trouble putting on his flak vest.

During a raid on a suspected insurgent hideout, the Iraqis discovered they'd forgotten their bolt cutters. Instead of sending someone back to get them, they tried breaking a lock off an outside gate with the butts of their AK-47s. By the time they were through, they'd made so much noise that everyone in the neighborhood was aware of their presence on what was supposed to be a stealth operation.

When they arrived at their second objective, still without bolt cutters, the men wanted to use grenades to breach the door.

Their supervisor, U.S. Army Capt. Terrence Sommers, stepped in and said they'd risk hurting themselves and would give away their position to insurgents.

"They've still got a ways to go," said Sommers, 34, of Trenton, N.J.

One of the Iraqi officers, Maj. Ahmed, said his men were less than motivated because they didn't understand why the Americans kept sweeping through towns and moving on without leaving troops behind to secure them.

"The people are scared to give us information about the terrorists because there are many terrorists here. And when we leave, the terrorists will come back and kill them," said Ahmed, who gave only his first name out of fear of retribution from the insurgents. "The army has to stay in these cities; that way we would have control. But this way, no, it doesn't make any sense."

On a nighttime raid in Ramadi this month, U.S. Army Sgt. 1st Class Chris Chapin, a military adviser to the Iraqi army, said he hadn't been able to get the Iraqi troops to mount a platoon-sized operation. Chapin had no interpreter with him, and none of the Iraqis could speak English.

"We definitely need to do something about this interpreter thing," said Sgt. 1st Class Anthony James, 33, of Vicksburg, Miss. "I don't see things changing here. We're not reaching the people."

Because the Iraqis and Americans couldn't communicate with one another, they frequently ended up wandering in the middle of the street, yelling commands in English and Arabic and heading in opposite directions.

Chapin, 39, of Proctor, Vt., walked around at one point, yelling, "Lieutenant, where is my lieutenant?" Two of the target houses were within a block of each other, and the entire neighborhood was probably aware of the soldiers' presence, blowing any chance of making a quiet entrance.

"They're always getting bunched into a gaggle, especially at night. I think it's because they're scared," said Sgt. Adam Detato, 24, of Montoursville, Pa. "Between the language barrier and a lot of them having a fifth-grade education, it's hard to teach them our tactics."

In Hit, Strickland finally managed to get three of the Iraqi soldiers to help him with the checkpoint. The fourth remained in the shade, making hand gestures indicating that he needed a light for his cigarette. Within five minutes the other three were making frequent motions toward the sun and then in the direction of the base. "Finish?" they asked. "We finish?"

A Marine standing nearby suggested to Stickland that maybe the answer was to train Iraqis as traffic police, give them orange vests and have them do traffic stops on their own.

Strickland laughed. "Yeah, until the muj finds out the Americans gave them the vests; then they'll kill `em," he said, referring to the insurgents by the Arabic word for "holy warrior," mujahedeen. "When they have problems, these guys will just leave their uniforms and walk off."

 

From:     http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3877

Republicans and Lynching- Hand in Hand Senator Lamar Alexander (Republican-TN) Senator Thad Cochran (Republican-MS) Senator John Cornyn (Republican-TX) Senator Michael Enzi (Republican-WY) Senator Chuck Grassley (Republican-IA) Senator Judd Gregg (Republican-NH) Senator Orrin Hatch (Republican-UT) **Senator Trent Lott (Republican-MS) Senator John Sununu (Republican-NH) Senator Craig Thomas (Republican-WY) Above is a list of the good Christian white Senators who declined a chance on June 13, 2005 to publicly apologize to the world for the 4,742+ blacks and others lynched by fellow good Christian whites in this country. Up until 1960 over 200 anti-lynching bills were introduced into congress, only to be shot down by- you guessed it- good Christian whites in Congress. Regarding the list of Senators above, connect these dots: each and every one is WHITE and REPUBLICAN and a *FUNDY CHRISTIAN.  If you are a black African-American, never forget this: regardless of their hype to the contrary, ***Christianity and the Republican Party are NOT now and never WERE your friends. *All listed as 100% ok by the rabidly Fundy group Christian Coalition.  **Sen. Trent Lott got caught singing the praises of  white supremacy groups in 1998. ***The Bible is quite vocal in its support of slavery.

A Typical Lynching Click on the photo to see a website with about 100 more. Learn what the good Christians in this country used to REALLY do in the so-called "good old days" they long for all the time.

Amend The Constitution!  (by Mark Smith)       Seeing how the evil Demon-crats may try to impeach our good & godly president for his war crimes regarding his invasion and conquest of Iraq upon false pretenses, we should amend the constitution so that such immoral and unchristian actions will be perfectly legal in the future. We propose the following:      Whatsoever a Republican president says, be it true or false, becomes the official true truth upon which our government shall act. Therefore, if a Republican president claims (with or without manufactured false evidence) that Canada or Mexico or England or Russia or China or France or the Vatican or all of them put together have secret weapons of mass destruction,  that becomes the truth- the true truth- and we as self-declared global defenders of freedom and all that's good in the world- we are free to declare war on those godless heathens, take them over, for their own good of course,  and Halliburton gets to make vast profits off of rebuilding them as just compensation for everyone else's time and trouble. And we get to set up whatever type of government we want, again, for their own good. And any who oppose us in these countries  or at home will automatically be labeled as "terrorist combatants"  under the Patriot Act, and get locked away in Gitmo without trial for  life.    Amen and Amend the constitution now!

George Galloway- Iraq War Based on Pack of Lies

It took a foreigner, George Galloway, a member of Britain's Parliament, to break thru Bush's gag on the U.S. media to expose the Bushit  (Bush + Bullshit = Bushit) on Iraq for what it is. Too bad he can't run for president, but he is scheduled to be on a speaking tour in the USA, summer of 2005. You can read below what he said in testimony before a Senate sub-committee (3-17-05), or click his photo and hear for yourself. **********************  "I gave my heart and soul to stop you committing the disaster that you did commit in invading Iraq. And I told the world that your case for the war was a PACK OF LIES.  I told the world that Iraq, contrary to your claims, did not have weapons of mass destruction. I told the world, contrary to your claims, that Iraq had no connection to al-Qaida. I told the world, contrary to your claims, that Iraq had no connection to the atrocity on 9-11, 2001. I told the world, contrary to your claims, that the Iraqi people would resist a British and American invasion of their country, and that the fall of Baghdad would not be the beginning of the end, but merely the end of the beginning. Senator [Coleman], in everything I said about Iraq I turned out to be right and you turned out to be wrong, and 100,000 people have paid with their lives, 1,600 of them American soldiers, sent to their deaths on a pack of lies. 15,000 of them wounded, many of them disabled forever, on a PACK OF LIES. If the world had listened... to me, we would not be in the disaster we are in today. Senator, this (hearing) is the mother of all smokescreens. You are trying to divert attention from the crimes that you supported, from the theft of billions of dollars of Iraq's wealth. Have a look at the real "oil for food" scandal, have a look at the 14 months you were in charge of Baghdad, the first 14 months, when $8.8 BILLION dollars of Iraq's wealth went missing, on your watch. Have a look at Halliburton and the other American corporations, that stole not only Iraq's money, but also the money of the American tax payer. Have a look at the oil that you didn't even meter, that you were shipping out of the country, the proceeds of which went who knows where. Have a look at the $800 million dollars to gave to American military commanders to hand out around the country, without even counting it or weighing it. Have a look at the real scandal breaking in the newspapers today, that the biggest sanction busters...  were your own companies, with the connivance of your own government." For audio clips of their blatant lies, listen to: Pack of Lies. For  more information about the man behind "the pack of lies", see my page:    Bush Must Go Support The Troops: How?    By not using them as human targets for Muslim nutcases invited to Iraq by Bush himself via his insane "Bring It On!!!" challenge. Bring them home NOW to prevent any further wasted death or dismemberment. Bush started this war as a family grudge match against Saddam- that being the case, let Bush or his daughters go over and fight it, and this time no chicken-shit hiding out in the Texas Air National Guard.