This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Foreign Policy

  • Bush blamed for Holocaust

    I’m attempting to track down the roots of this Armenian Genocide legislation because last night, Crotchety Old Bastard and I had an email exchange over it and we arrived at the same conclusion; this is nothing more than an attempt by the Democrats to defund the war effort in Iraq and Afghanistan. Yesterday, Ralph Peters arrived at that same conclusion in the New York Sun;

    That’s what the Democrats are aiming at. This resolution isn’t about justice for the Armenians. Not this time. It’s a stunningly devious attempt to impede our war effort in Iraq and force premature troop withdrawals.

    The Dems calculate that, without those flights and convoys, we won’t be able to keep our troops adequately supplied. Key intelligence and strike missions would disappear.

    The Pentagon might be able to improvise other options. But the loss of the base and those routes would definitely hurt our troops. Severely. And we’d be more reliant than ever on a single, vulnerable lifeline running from Kuwait.

    It’s a brilliant ploy – the Dems get to stab our troops in the back, but lay the blame off on the Turks. They pretend they’re responding to their Armenian-American constituents – while actually moving to placate MoveOn.org.

    The Guardian explains the importance of Turkey to our logistical support of our own troops in the Middle East;

    Turkey, which is a major cargo hub for US and allied military forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, has recalled its ambassador to Washington for consultations and warned that there might be a cut in the logistical support to the US over the issue.

    About 70% of US air cargo headed for Iraq goes through Turkey as does about a third of the fuel used by the US military there. US bases also get water and other supplies carried in overland by Turkish truckers who cross into Iraq’s northern Kurdish region.

    Despite the general’s strong words and the recalling of its ambassador, it is not clear just how far the Turkish side can go in expressing its dismay to Washington.

    Turkey suspended its military ties with France last year after the French parliament’s lower house adopted a bill that would have made it a crime to deny that the Armenian killings constituted a genocide.

    To set the tone for the vote, Pelosi actually used a normally nonpartisan activity in the House to push the voting her way, according to USAToday;

    Yet with the House’s first order of business Wednesday, Speaker Nancy Pelosi made clear that Turkey’s position was a hard sell. She introduced the Supreme Patriarch of all Armenians, Karekin II, to deliver the morning prayer — a daily ritual intended to be apolitical.

    “With the solemn burden of history, we remember the victims of the genocide of the Armenians,” Karekin said in the House. “Give peace and justice on their descendants.” 

    Sneaky and underhanded. Even California Democrat and Holocaust survivor Tom Lantos opposes pelosi’s latest dirt-dishing to the troops (USAToday);

    The Foreign Affairs Committee’s Chairman, Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., warned of the potential fallout if the proposal passed. Lantos, a Hungarian-born survivor of the Holocaust, supported a similar resolution two years ago.

    “We have to weigh the desire to express our solidarity with the Armenian people … against the risk that it could cause young men and women in the uniform of the United States armed services to pay an even heavier price than they are currently paying,” Lantos said. 

    When Bill Clinton asked Dennis Hastart to cancel a similar bill in 2000, Hastert conceded that Clinton had primacy in foreign policy dealings for the United States by virtue of his office and deferred to Clinton’s judgement, according to CNN:

    House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Illinois, said the resolution had been pulled after President Bill Clinton said he was “deeply concerned” about the language in the document. Clinton and Hastert talked by telephone on Wednesday night about the legislation.

    Hastert said Clinton had warned of “possible far-reaching negative consequences for the United States” if the House voted on the legislation.

    Pelosi and Steny Hoyer even visited the Turkish Ambassador before he was recalled to discuss the issue and came away the pompous idiots they’ve always been;

    Pelosi and the second-ranking Democrat in the House, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, met Wednesday with Turkish Ambassador Nabi Sensoy but emerged from the meeting unswayed. Hoyer told reporters he expects a floor vote on the measure before the House adjourns for the year.

    Hoyer said he hoped that Turkey would realize it is not a condemnation of its current government but rather of “another government, at another time.”

    Norman Markowitz takes the whole discussion one step further in Political Affairs Magazine – he blames Bush for the Holocaust of the 1930s and 40s;

    In 1931, Adolph Hitler, two years before the establishment of the Nazi dictatorship said “we intend to introduce a great resettlement policy….remember the extermination of the Armenians.” In 1939, in advocating a policy of mass killing in Poland to take the “Living Space” for Germans, he said privately to his officers, “who, after all speaks today, of the annihilation of the Armenians.

    Who does? Civilized people throughout the world for whom human rights aren’t an empty slogan. But not the Bush administration, its State Department, and its policy planners who have gone from one disaster after another in the Middle East and everywhere else.

    Hopefully, the U.S. Congress will remember.

    Remember? Historians will remember that the Democrat “leadership” (using the term loosely) are a traitorous bunch of double-dealing, back-stabbing punk-ass sissies who can’t summon the fortitude to stand up to a few squeakywheels on the internet. That’ll be their legacy.

    This isn’t my last word on this – I’ve got some interviews scheduled. 

  • How to undermine US foreign policy

    Since Nancy Pelosi’s attempt to undermine our foreign policy in the Middle East didn’t quite work when she went to Syria – and then the Israelis exposed Syria’s nuclear ambitions, she’s decided to attack our allies instead of cozying up to our enemies for a change. Perhaps that’ll work a little better to destroy our efforts in the region. So out of a clear blue sky, with no rhyme, no reason, Congress decides to condemn a ninety-year-old  genocide;

    President Bush has said the resolution is the wrong response to the Armenian deaths, but House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the measure’s timing was important “because many of the survivors are very old.”

    “It is a statement made by 23 other countries. We would be the 24th country to make this statement. Genocide still exists, and we saw it in Rwanda; we see it now in Darfur,” she told ABC’s “This Week” in an interview broadcast Sunday.

    But Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, said the measure was “irresponsible.”

    “Listen, there’s no question that the suffering of the Armenian people some 90 years ago was extreme. But what happened 90 years ago ought to be a subject for historians to sort out, not politicians here in Washington,” he told “Fox News Sunday.”

    “…many are very old”, Nancy? I’ll bet none are under the age of 90 – that makes them ALL old. Although most probably look younger than you and John Murtha.

    Even a half-witted moron can see that the Democrats in Congress are trying to destroy our relations with Turkey – the same as Barack Obama threatened Pakistan. Does anyone think the Democrats might condemn Viet Nam, China or Iran for human rights abuses they’re engaged in at this moment? Nope, they rather drag up long-dead ghosts and jeopardize relations with allies – it’s much more politically popular.

    A condemnation of an event 90-years ago can serve no useful purpose – but that’s never stopped Democrats before. They’re accustomed to making empty gestures. They’re an empty party with empty ideas. The Turks are so angered, they’ve recalled their diplomat – if President Bush had provoked that reaction from China or Russia, the Dems would be screaming bloody murder.

    Although I agree that it was a horrible event and that Turkey should have the integrity to admit their culpability, I don’t think it’s so important at this late stage of our history to make a useless statement that could damage our relations with an important mostly-secular regional partner in the war against extreme Muslims in the Middle East.

    Blue Crab Boulevard quotes Ralph Peters on the same subject;

    Legislation similar to this has come up repeatedly in Congress, yet it’s always been defeated – in 2000, because of pressure from the Clinton administration. But if the resolution passes the House and Senate now, the Turks plan to evict us from Incirlik airbase in southeastern Turkey, to halt our military over-flight privileges and to shut down the supply routes into northern Iraq.

    That’s what the Democrats are aiming at. This resolution isn’t about justice for the Armenians. Not this time. It’s a stunningly devious attempt to impede our war effort in Iraq and force premature troop withdrawals.

    Devious isn’t a strong enough word, how about traitorous. It’s only an attempt to regain some credibility among their base at the expense of our ability to support soldiers in the field. That’s traitorous. 

  • Pro-junta rally camoflages arrests

    The ruling junta organized a rally in support of itself yesterday according to Reuters;

    Burma’s junta staged a massive pro-government rally in its main city yesterday and arrested a top dissident as its relentless and ruthless response to last month’s pro-democracy uprising showed no signs of easing.

    Htay Kywe, a prominent student activist from an uprising in 1988, was detained overnight with three others in one of the many raids still being conducted by police more than two weeks after soldiers were sent in to crush demonstrations.

    The 39-year-old, a leading light in the so-called “88 Generation Students Group,” had managed to remain at large since 13 of his comrades were arrested in a series of midnight swoops on Aug. 21.

    “They had felt the net closing in for several days,” a close friend, now in exile, said in Bangkok, the capital of neighboring Thailand.

    But not to worry, the UN’s envoy is enroute to coordinate a local response, according to another Reuters story;

    U.N. special envoy Ibrahim Gambari was flying into Bangkok ahead of Monday talks with Thailand’s leaders. He was then to travel to Malaysia, Indonesia, India, China and Japan before returning to Myanmar, where the junta faces growing pressure to halt its crackdown on pro-democracy protesters and open talks with the democratic opposition.

    And the junta is very receptive to discussions with pro-democracy elements within the country as evidenced by this quote;

    “There will emerge a peaceful, modern and developed democratic nation — according to the state’s seven-step road map,” a newspaper editorial said. It added that citizens “who are shouting at full-blast” for U.N. intervention were traitors “trying to hand over their motherland to alien countries.”

    “Such national traitors will soon meet their tragic ends,” the editorial said.

    Sounds like they’re caving, huh? Well, as long as there’s nothing to threaten China’s commerce in the area, what do the members of the junta have to fear with China and Russia running a screen play for them in the Security Council. I guess no one’s going to complain about President Bush’s unilateral actions against Burma are they?

    The junta has restored internet access, but you can be sure that it’s not without a monitoring system in place;

    “The Internet connection was restored on Saturday afternoon, but we still haven’t decided whether or not to reopen our internet cafe yet,” a Yangon Internet cafe owner said.

    There had been intermittent access to the Internet over the past week, mostly during a curfew first imposed as the junta sent the army in to end protests led by thousands of Buddhist monks.

    They’re still rounding up dissidents;

    Security forces on Saturday arrested four prominent political activists who went into hiding to escape a government manhunt after leading some of the first major marches against the government several weeks ago, Amnesty International said.

    Among those detained was one of Myanmar’s most famous dissidents, Htay Kywe. Others arrested were Aung Htoo and Thin Thin Aye, also known as Mie Mie.

    The three were believed to be the last remaining activists at large from the 88 Generation Students’ Group — the country’s boldest dissident group — which was at the forefront of a 1988 democracy uprising and one of the main forces behind the protests that started in August.

    A fourth activist, Ko Ko, was also arrested, the London-based rights group said. All four were believed to have been rounded up in Yangon, the country’s main city.

    Gateway Pundit posted the shooting of a Burmese boy on Friday. Cheap Flights Asia blog reports that a London-based insurer has pulled coverage from Myanmar International Airways – the Burmese airline – effectively grounding flights from Burma. Agam’s Gecko posted a video of a multi-faith show of support for the Burmese people in northern Thailand. Five-Year.com has al-Jazeera video of interviews with Burmese dissidents in Thailand.

    Pseudonymity reports that the Butcher of Depayin (from the 2003 uprising in Burma) has died. Warrior Lawyer writes that without an internal uprising among the Burmese military, the movement is probably doomed without international pressure.

    Spanish Pundit reports that Burmese have been tortured to death;

    Members of the 88 Generation Students and other detainees who have been arrested by authorities are now being tortured in Insein interrogation center and other detention facilities.Some have been tortured to death and others have been hospitalized in serious condition, according to sources.
    A source close to authorities in Insein prison told The Irrawaddy on Thursday that many prisoners are tortured and some are now hospitalized in serious condition, including Min Ko Naing, a prominent student leader. The source requested anonymity for his safety. 

    She also writes that India, North Korea, China and Russia are still selling weapons to the Myanmar Junta.

    But it’ll end at any minute, now – the UN has issued an extremely tepid condemnation;

    “Amnesty International believes that these high-profile opposition figures are at grave risk of torture and mistreatment,” said Daniel Alberman, an Amnesty spokesman. “The eyes of the world are on Myanmar, and the authorities will be judged by how all those who have been detained in recent weeks are treated.”

    The United Nations has spearheaded an international effort to push the military, which has ruled Myanmar since 1962, to halt its crackdown and enter negotiations with detained National League for Democracy party leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

    The U.N. Security Council issued its first statement on Myanmar on Thursday, condemning the violence against protesters and emphasizing “the importance of the early release of all political prisoners and remaining detainees.” It also called for a “genuine dialogue” between the country’s military rulers and the pro-democracy opposition.

    Yeah, a “genuine dialogue”, I guess that’s not up for interpretation, is it? This has been going on since 1962 and this is the first time the UN has bothered itself enough to issue a statement? Yet how many statements has it issued against Israel and the US?

    Why isn’t the UN getting ahead of impending refugee crisis? Reports of refugees being mugged at the Thai border (by the Thai military) are rampant – why isn’t the UN setting up refugee camps if they can’t drag their bloated asses into action to prevent the exodus? Well, the easy answer is; it’s easier to ask for money from UN members when there are pictures of grisly scenes. That’s what the UN is waiting for – propaganda to hold a telethon. You’d think that people whose only job is to provide for refugees would be on top of this, wouldn’t you? (I’m assuming my readers are rational people – not UN beaurocrats)

    Just like in Darfur where hundreds of thousands are dead and millions displaced – it’s been going on for twelve years but now everyone is getting exercised over it as a fundraising tool. So let’s have a genocide conference and beg someone else to do it.

  • Junta cracks down on monks – again

     

    Photo from Kate

    According to CNN, the Myanmar junta is manufacturing evidence against the revered Buddist monks;

    Myanmar’s military leaders said weapons had been seized from Buddhist monasteries and announced dozens of new arrests Sunday, defying global outrage over its violent repression of protesters who sought an end to 45 years of dictatorship.

    Recent raids on monasteries turned up guns, knives and ammunition, though it was not yet clear to whom they belonged, according to The New Light of Myanmar, a mouthpiece of the junta. The government threatened to punish any monks that violate the law, stepping up pressure on clerics who led the protests.

    “Monks must adhere to the laws of God and the government,” the paper wrote. “If they violate those laws, action could be taken against them.”

    Security eased in the largest city of Yangon more than a week after soldiers and police opened fire on demonstrators. Some roadblocks were removed and visitors began trickling back to the heavily guarded Shwedagon and Sule pagodas, the starting and finishing points of protests that began in mid-August over a sharp fuel price increase.

    I can’t imagine where monks would get weapons – or what good they figured knives would do to help them against armed soldiers. Since the monks have traditionally only used civil disobediance and have shunned violence in their protests, it seems unlikely they were hording weapons.

    The UN in the meantime is still shuffling it’s feet towards any real action;

    Faced with mounting world outrage over violence in Myanmar, the UN Security Council was to meet Monday under pressure to quickly condemn the military regime for crushing pro-democracy protests.
     
    The 15-member body was to weigh a draft statement that would condemn “the violent repression of peaceful demonstrations” by Myanmar’s rulers, urge them to “cease repressive measures” and release detainees as well as all political prisoners, including opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

    The non-binding text, drafted by the United States, Britain and France, was submitted Friday to the full council after members heard a report from UN emissary Ibrahim Gambari on his recent mission to defuse the crisis.

    Of course, China and Russia are still blocking any UN action against the junta declaring that it’s strictly an internal matter. Probably because both have a poor record of human rights and don’t want to start a precedent of the UN supporting democracy movements.

    The Sunday Times (h/t Aftermath News) is circulating rumors of mass cremations. I guess the junta needed even more Nazi imagery, I suppose;

    THE Burmese army has burnt an undetermined number of bodies at a crematorium sealed off by armed guards northeast of Rangoon over the past seven days, ensuring that the exact death toll in the recent pro-democracy protests will never be known.

    The secret cremations have been reported by local people who have seen olive green trucks covered with tarpaulins rumbling through the area at night and watched smoke rising continuously from the furnace chimneys.

    They say they have watched soldiers in steel helmets blocking off roads to the municipal crematorium and threatening people who poke their heads out of windows overlooking the roads after the 10pm curfew.

    Blue Crab Boulevard quotes from the Times Online that the junta has stormed UN offices and demanded their hard drives to hunt down dissidents. I wonder how the UN will react to this;

    Burma’s ruling junta is attempting to seize United Nations computers containing information on opposition activists in the latest stage of its brutal crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrations, The Times has learnt.

    UN staff were thrown into panic over the weekend after Burmese police and diplomats entered its offices in Rangoon and demanded hard drives from its computers.

    The discs contain information that could help the dictatorship to identify key members of the opposition movement, many of whom have gone underground. UN staff spent much of the weekend deleting information.

    What the junta really needs is Jimmy Carter to come over and certify that there are no mass deaths in Burma, like he’s just done for Darfur (h/t Gateway Pundit and Sweetness and Light);

    The United States is exaggerating when it described the Darfur conflict as “genocide,” former US president Jimmy Carter has said, warning that the use of the term was legally inaccurate and “unhelpful,” The Christian Science Monitor reported Friday.

    Talk about “unhelpful”, I think that’s the term we can use to describe Jimmy Carter for the last 41 years when we need a one-word adjective to understate his foreign policy dalliances.

    Spanish Pundit has a report on the protests against the junta in Asia and Europe. Kate at A Columbo-Americana’s Perspective has pictures of the protest yesterday in DC and  New York City. She also has a list of upcoming protests worldwide.

    There was also a protest in Hong Kong today for their own democracy – that’s fairly significant since, Hong Kong is in, ya know, China – one of the Security Council members blocking UN action in Burma. Oddly, the story has disappeared, so I stole the picture while I still could (found it again at WebIndia);

     

     The Bristol Blogger recommends a Nobel prize for the Monks – I’ll go along especially if it squeezes Al Gore out of the running.

  • Night raids in Myanmar

    Hoping the world is still looking at the two Koreas and the South African mine disaster, the Myanmar government stepped up repression of the revolt last night (CNN/AP); 

    After crushing the democracy uprising with guns, Myanmar’s junta stepped up its campaign to intimidate citizens Wednesday, sending troops to drag people from their homes in the middle of the night and letting others know they were marked for retribution.

    “We have photographs! We are going to make arrests!” soldiers yelled from loudspeakers on military vehicles that patrolled the streets in Yangon, Myanmar’s biggest city

    People living near the Shwedagon Pagoda, Myanmar’s most revered shrine and a flash point of unrest during the protests, reported that security forces swept through several dozen homes about 3 a.m., taking away many men and even some women for questioning.

    A U.N. Development Program employee, Myint Nwe Moe, and her husband, brother-in-law and driver were among those detained, the U.N. agency said.

    Dozens of Buddhist monks jammed Yangon’s main train station after being ordered to vacate their monasteries — centers of the anti-government demonstrations — and told to go back to their hometowns and villages.

    Another AP story on CNN tells of the brutality perpetrated on ethnic minorities in Myanmar;

    The Karen, the Shan and other minority groups who live along the Myanmar-Thai border have been attacked, raped and killed by government soldiers. Their thatched-roofed, bamboo homes have been torched. Men have been seized into forced labor for the army, while women, children and the elderly either hide out in nearby jungles until the soldiers leave or flee over the mountains to crowded, makeshift refugee camps.

    “Many, many thousands of Karen have died in those 60 years,” Karen National Union secretary general Mahn Sha said this week of his people’s struggle for autonomy since 1947.

    The military junta has denied reports of atrocities and says the ethnic rebels are “terrorists” trying to overthrow the government.

    And the UN fiddles. Meanwhile, Enzo  (with a hat tip to Kate) reports that, after the night time raids;

    The only thing of which one can be sure is that somewhere in the country large numbers of people are being held in an invisible prison camp, without charge, without legal recourse and without the ability to communicate.

    Incognito warns that there’s a Burma-related email virus. Kate emails me that Sylvester “John Rambo” Stallone witnessed the atrocities in Burma while making Rambo 4 – but one must wonder why he waited for Myanmar to become world news before he bothered to mention it – couldn’t be the publicity, could it?

    Gateway Pundit reports 50 students get 5 years at hard labor for last week’s protests.

  • Hugo Chavez officially off his rocker

    I’ve written before that Chavez plans to move his clock ahead 1/2 hour but he let that idea fall off the radar until now (Pravda/AP);

    Hugo Chavez’s plan to turn back clocks by a half-hour has some Venezuelans pleased at the prospect of sleeping in. Others seem vexed that Chavez is making the entire nation change its daily rhythm. Some bloggers suggest Chavez wants to get out of Washington’s “imperialist” time zone, but Venezuela will be a half-hour apart from his Cuban allies as well.
     
    “It seems crazy to me,” says 38-year-old Maritza Mendoza, who sells orange juice from a sidewalk stand in downtown Caracas. “It’s a whim, just like the change of the currency.”

    Venezuela’s upcoming launch of the “strong bolivar” – eliminating three zeros and reducing bills to 2-, 5-, 10-, 20-, 50-, and 100-bolivar denominations – joins a growing list of changes promoted by Chavez. He’s transformed the national seal, the national flag and even the country’s name – now the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, after independence hero Simon Bolivar.

    So by adding a 1/2 hour to the time will make Venezuelans more productive and knocking off a few zeros, will save the bolivar, and Venezuela will be a paradise – well, except for the evil CIA (AP);

    President Hugo Chavez accused the U.S. on Wednesday of trying to spur a military rebellion, saying the CIA is behind the distribution of leaflets inside army barracks calling for his ouster.
     
    Speaking to dozens of army officers at Venezuela’s largest military base, Chavez urged soldiers to resist calls for a coup from “oligarchs and their imperialist masters,” a reference to the United States.

    “They will always try to divide us and confuse us to weaken us, and thereby dominate us,” said Chavez, who weathered a short-lived coup in 2002.

    Noting that leaflets calling for a rebellion have been circulating in army barracks recently, he said: “That’s why they have the CIA.”

    I’m pretty sure that if the CIA got inside the Venezuelan Army barracks, they’d do a little more than leave pieces of paper laying around.

    Jungle Mom at The Jungle Hut writes that Venezuelan Jews are more than a little worried about Chavez’ threat to close down schools which don’t teach the chavista party line. Julia at The End of Venezuela as I Know It gives a glimpse of what’s inside her 11-year-old niece’s textbooks – complete with anti-Bush cartoons.

    Daniel at Venezuela’s News and Views asks “Where is the success of Chavez’ economic  policies?” The Devil’s Excrement questions the Venezuelan government’s report that inflation was at 1.3% for September charging that food and beverages are increasing at 25%. The chavistas claim it’s because food and bevergaes aren’t controlled by the government;

    According to the Central Bank of Venezuela, inflation for September was largely driven by the increase of prices on products outside of government price controls, which rose by 2 per cent, whereas products under government price controls rose only 0.5%

    But, hey, that one day the clocks change, you’ll get an extra half-hour sleep. Yay!

  • Neverending trouble in Burma

    As the world’s attention shifts elsewhere this week, things are looking bad for the Burmese. The UN official tasked with seeking a solution to the Myanmar government’s brutal suppression of protests last week, finally met with the junta leader, Than Shwe, after waiting four days and got a whole 15 minutes, according to Gateway Pundit.

    Spanish Pundit writes, from Burmanet News that the Burmese monks, which have survived, could be forced into hard labor.

    Among those detained are young monks aged between 16 and 18, and novices as young as 5 to 10 years old. Nuns are also being held at the compound, along with 140 other women. All monks and nuns have been disrobed and made to wear civilian clothes.

    Yahoo’s India News reports that thousands may already be in concentration camps;

    Thousands of pro-democracy protestors, including several hundreds monks in Yangon have gone missing, and are reportedly being lodged in secret government buildings which have been converted into concentration camps, according to a London daily.

    Seventeen hundred protestors, including monks, women and children, have been reportedly confined inside the former campus of the Government Technology Institute.

    Blogmeister reports that now that junta has rounded up monks and safely dealt with them, the Myanmar government is now hunting Burmese bloggers – the major source of reports of events there. An AP report tends to suggest that’s true;

    The government has ordered local officials and hotels to be on the lookout for key pro-democracy activists, sending out their names and photos, said a local official who asked not to be named for fear of retaliation.

    “We have been instructed to inform higher authorities immediately if we sight any of these people in our area,” he said. The list of dissidents includes at least one member of the 88 Generation Students group, the most active in carrying out nonviolent anti-government protests, the official said. Most of the group’s top members were arrested Aug. 21, two days after the first of the current round of protests.

    And the Myanmar government has learned from Noreiga and Chavez to use civilian thugs to do the dirty work;

     “I believe the junta does not use uniformed personnel because they don’t want to be blamed for their action,” said a diplomat who asked not to be identified because of protocol. “Now that they are using civilians, they can claim, as they have done in newspapers, that it was the agitated public that stopped the protesters.”

    Times Online tells the story of one Myanmar soldier’s decision to flee instead of shooting Monks. And just now, more than week after the brutal killings in Rangoon, the UN starts shifting around in it’s collective ample seat.

    CNN quotes an aide worker’s account of the violence last week;

    “There was a body lying on the road, there was another body slumped over the back of the truck,” said the woman, who did not want to be identified for security reasons.

    “There were crowds gathered approximately 400 meters away but they were not coming closer to help out. And it just looked like (the bodies) had been left there for people to witness, for people to see what they were capable of.”

    And Myanmar’s foreign minister charges political opportunists;

    Myanmar’s foreign minister U Nyan Win on Monday blamed intense pro-democracy demonstrations in his country on “political opportunists” and declared that “normalcy has now returned to Myanmar.”

    Addressing the U.N. General Assembly, Win defended what he called the government’s “seven-step road map” to draft a new constitution and hold elections.

    “Recent events make clear that there are elements within and outside the country who wish to derail the ongoing process so that they can take advantage of the chaos that would follow,” he said. “They have become more and more emboldened and have stepped up their campaign to confront the government.”

    Bloodthirsty Liberal and Christopher Hitchens (ya know, I saw him at the protest last week, I recognized him as someone I should know, but I couldn’t figure out who Hitchens was – I realize it was him now – but he got a haircut since last time I saw him) identify the common thread that runs through every brutal regime in the world, including Burma - China;

    China, a key trading power and importer of gas from Myanmar, has refused to take sides in the unrest so far, and Premier Wen Jiabao called Saturday on “all parties” to exercise restraint and seek stability “through peaceful means”.

    But Russia’s not much help, either;

    Russia’s ambassador to the council did strike a more moderate tone, saying that Myanmar’s problems should be solved by peaceful dialogue and democratic changes without any pressure from outside.

    With rumors of tens of thousands of dead, negotiation hardly sounds reasonable at this point. Kate of A Columbo-Americana’s Perspective writes that there’s another protest at the Myanmar Embassy Friday.

  • Obey: War tax to end the war

    David Obey, the chair of the House Appropriations Committee has decided since the Democrats can’t get a draft started, they’ll charge Americans a tax to fan anti-war flames (Washington Times);

    Rep. David R. Obey, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, yesterday threatened unilaterally to block President Bush’s $189 billion emergency war-funding bill to force a U.S. pullout from Iraq and called for levying a surtax to cover the war’s costs.

    Mr. Obey, breaking with the Democratic leadership that has failed repeatedly to end the Iraq war, said unless Mr. Bush establishes a goal to abort combat operations in Iraq by January, he would act alone to cut off war spending.

    “Future generations should not be saddled with paying for an ill-advised war in Iraq that seems to be never-ending,” said the Wisconsin Democrat, who could use his powerful post to lock up the funding bill in committee. “If this war is important enough to fight, then it ought to be important enough to pay for.”

    The proposed income-tax surcharge — a progressive tax ranging from 2 percent to about 15 percent — would net $150 billion a year to cover the cost of the war in Iraq, said Mr. Obey.

    That’s the solution to every problem, I suppose – tax stuff you disagree with.

    Mr. Obey’s proposals did not target the war in Afghanistan, which he said was a justifiable war because the Taliban supported al Qaeda before the September 11, 2001, terrorist attack.

    “It is to draw a meaningful line in the sand,” said Rep. Jim McGovern, Massachusetts Democrat and an outspoken war critic. Mr. McGovern and Rep. John P. Murtha, Pennsylvania Democrat, were at Mr. Obey’s side when he announced the surtax plan.

    Yep, the war in Afghanistan is justifiable as long as you look at the war as pure revenge (an emotional response, not a rational response) instead of considering the fact that those 19,000 jihadists we’ve killed in Iraq could’ve been running all over the planet blowing themselves up along with innocent people. But the Democrats can’t just get past the fact that war is not a legal action – it’s a defensive action. All war has a preemptive nature.

    The Wall Street Journal’s David Rogers writes;

    House rules permit Republicans and prowar Democrats to try to go around Mr. Obey and force action on spending. But the chairman’s stand, blessed by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.), represents a significant escalation of the conflict with the administration.

    It came as moderates in the war debate enjoyed a rare triumph on the House floor. By 377-46, members approved requiring the Pentagon to report regularly to Congress on the status of planning for the redeployment of troops from Iraq.

    Supporters argued it was a first step to end partisan sniping, but many House Democrats remain frustrated by the pace of change in Iraq policy.

    In the past, they have approved Iraq funding with restrictions, only to see these amendments watered down in the Senate because of White House veto threats and Republican filibusters. Ms. Pelosi doesn’t hide her impatience: “We can’t go as slow as that ship” she said of the Senate last week.

    Mr. Obey gives her more leverage. Choosing not to move legislation is “our strongest card at this point,” he said.

    So, not surprisingly, Murtha (Mr. Pink Badge of Courage) and Pelosi are behind this latest end run around the Administration’s honest attempts at winning this war in our favor – as opposed to the Democrats who want to lose this war so they can win the presidency next year. All of this despite the fact that the war in Iraq is being won (as reported by Gateway Pundit and Bill Roggio and Bill Roggio again)

    So why would Democrats try these end runs around the administration? Because it’s their last chance to make splash – it’s their last chance to look like they’ve done something in this war against terror – even though it helps the terrorists. Just to stroke their critics on the extreme left wing.

    Democrats’ spinlessness gives hope to every jihadist in the world – especially those arrayed against our troops in Iraq. I’m sure Pelosi, et al. hope to spark courage in the Mahdi Army again so Democrats can point and call it a civil war – since it hasn’t been a civil war for months and the Iraqis are helping US forces to drive al Qaeda out.