http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/23/AR2006112301007.html

Wang Guangya, China's U.N. ambassador, said that China is filling a vacuum left by the West. "The major powers are withdrawing from the peacekeeping role," he said. "That role is being played more by small countries. China felt it is the right time for us to fill this vacuum. We want to play our role."

China's participation in U.N. peacekeeping missions has generally served to bolster its relationship with Washington and other Western governments. In some cases, though, the higher profile has led to strains, such as when the United States blocked China's call for condemnation of an Israeli strike that killed four unarmed U.N. military observers, including a Chinese national.

"China has had global leadership thrust upon it," said Elizabeth Economy, director of Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. She said China's new role has forced the government to counter the perception that it is interested only in exploiting resources in places such as Africa. "It has a number of reputational risks. Being seen as a force for peace and security is an important and good first step."

Prosecuting a war of aggression isn't Rumsfeld's only crime. He also participated in the highest levels of decision-making that allowed the extrajudicial execution of several people. Willful killing is a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions, which constitutes a war crime. In his book, Chain of Command: The Road from 9/11 to Abu Ghraib, Seymour Hersh described the "unacknowledged" special-access program (SAP) established by a top-secret order Bush signed in late 2001 or early 2002. It authorized the Defense Department to set up a clandestine team of Special Forces operatives to defy international law and snatch, or assassinate, anyone considered a "high-value" Al Qaeda operative, anywhere in the world. Rumsfeld expanded SAP into Iraq in August 2003.

But Rumsfeld's crimes don't end there. He sanctioned the use of torture and cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, which are grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions, and thus constitute war crimes. Rumsfeld approved interrogation techniques that included the use of dogs, removal of clothing, hooding, stress positions, isolation for up to 30 days, 20-hour interrogations, and deprivation of light and auditory stimuli. According to Seymour Hersh, Rumsfeld sanctioned the use of physical coercion and sexual humiliation to extract information from prisoners. Rumsfeld also authorized waterboarding, where the interrogator induces the sensation of imminent death by drowning. Waterboarding is widely considered a form of torture.

http://www.alternet.org/story/44213/

I left out some of Rumsfeld's crimes. I say we put them in a ring and duke it out, winner lives and loser dies. The Coalition of the stupid and depraved.

I say that's the most probable explanation, because the biggest drop in crime (about a 2 percent drop for every million people watching violent movies) occurs between 6 p.m. and midnight—the prime moviegoing hours. And what happens when the theaters close? Answer: Crime stays down, though not by quite as much. Dahl and DellaVigna speculate that this is because two hours at the movies means two hours of drinking Coke instead of beer, with sobering effects that persist right on through till morning. Speaking of morning, after 6 a.m., crime returns to its original level.

What about those experiments you learned about in freshman psych, where subjects exposed to violent images were more willing to turn up the voltage on actors who they believed were receiving painful electric shocks? Those experiments demonstrate, perhaps, that most people become more violent after viewing violent images. But that's the wrong question here. The right question is: Do the sort of people who commit violent crimes commit more crimes when they watch violence? And the answer appears to be no, for the simple reason that they can't commit crimes and watch movies simultaneously.

OK, so we can at least tentatively conclude that Net access reduces rape. But that's a far cry from proving that porn access reduces rape. Maybe rape is down because the rapists are all indoors reading Slate or vandalizing Wikipedia. But professor Kendall points out that there is no similar effect of Internet access on homicide. It's hard to see how Wikipedia can deter rape without deterring other violent crimes at the same time. On the other hand, it's easy to imagine how porn might serve as a substitute for rape.

If not Wikipedia, then what? Maybe rape is down because former rapists have found their true loves on Match.com. But professor Kendall points out that the effects are strongest among 15-year-old to 19-year-old perpetrators—the group least likely to use such dating services.

http://www.slate.com/id/2152487/?nav=ais

When I asked Wendy Hall, a spokeswoman for Halliburton, a couple of years ago if Halliburton would stop doing business with Iran because of concerns that the company helped fund terrorism she said, “No.” “We believe that decisions as to the nature of such governments and their actions are better made by governmental authorities and international entities such as the United Nations as opposed to individual persons or companies,” Hall said. “Putting politics aside, we and our affiliates operate in countries to the extent it is legally permissible, where our customers are active as they expect us to provide oilfield services support to their international operations. “We do not always agree with policies or actions of governments in every place that we do business and make no excuses for their behaviors. Due to the long-term nature of our business and the inevitability of political and social change, it is neither prudent nor appropriate for our company to establish our own country-by-country foreign policy.”

Halliburton first started doing business in Iran as early as 1995, while Vice President Cheney was chief executive of the company and in possible violation of U.S. sanctions.

An executive order signed by former President Bill Clinton in March 1995 prohibits “new investments (in Iran) by U.S. persons, including commitment of funds or other assets.” It also bars U.S. companies from performing services “that would benefit the Iranian oil industry” and provide Iran with the financial means to engage in terrorist activity.
When Bush and Cheney came into office in 2001, their administration decided it would not punish foreign oil and gas companies that invest in those countries. The sanctions imposed on countries like Iran and Libya before Bush became president were blasted by Cheney, who gave frequent speeches on the need for U.S. companies to compete with their foreign competitors, despite claims that those countries may have ties to terrorism.

http://www.projectcensored.org/censored_2007/index.htm#2

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So, uh, this will be taught in history classes right?

In July 1990 a Nebraska Grand Jury was convened to hear allegations that Lawrence "Larry" King, then manager of the Franklin Community Federal Credit Union and a rising Republican party star, along with Washington lobbyists, had set up a child prostitution ring in which minors were transported around the country and forced to have sex with King, other top officials, and according to victims who some allege were later harassed into recanting, then-Vice-President Bush.

The Grand Jury dismissed the case as a hoax but former Nebraska State Senator John DeCamp later investigated the claims and was horrified to learn that they were indeed legitimate...

The story is here: RABBIT HOLE OF ELITIST

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Sometimes when you go down the rabbit hole you end up in someones bum. I know. That's pretty bad, but in this case it's also true.

4. Most Iraqi Cities Have Active and Often Viable Local Governments

Neither the Iraqi government, nor the American-led occupation has a significant presence in most parts of Iraq. This is well-publicized in the three Kurdish provinces, which are ruled by a stable Kurdish government without any outside presence; less so in Shia urban areas where various religio-political groups -- notably the Sadrists, the Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), Da'wa , and Fadhila -- vie for local control, and then organize cities and towns around their own political and religious platforms. While there is often violent friction among these groups -- particularly when the contest for control of an area is undecided -- most cities and towns are largely peaceful as local governments and local populations struggle to provide city services without a viable national economy.

This situation also holds true in the Sunni areas, except when the occupation is actively trying to pacify them. When there is no fighting, local governments dominated by the religious and tribal leaders of the resistance establish the laws and maintain a kind of order, relying for law enforcement on guerrilla fighters and militia members.

http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?pid=114108

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I was feeling a little bored and decided to check out www.disinfo.com Man, Iraq would be a lot stronger if the US simply left. There is no direction, no vision of Iraq beyond the occupation. With America leaving there would be a lot of blood spilt as different rulers would try to take over feudal Iraq. But once leaders have stabalized areas the country would also become stronger finally rising from the ashes. With the US no longer being the enemy poverty, education and health could once again create something not democracy, but something better suited to those who live there. I don't think a country (US) has the right to occupy another country without setting up a true political, and legal system as well as an army. You're not a county without an army to protect the people, and a political element to plan strategies to help the public, and a legal element to correct errors and plan for better solutions.

My other option for Iraq is the one I had a long long time ago. Occupy one town at a time. Give them a government, army, and a legal system and a hospital and a school. Once leaders have been chosen and are respected or feared enough to kill off chaos occupy the next town and do the same. Once self government is established in each town it will be easier to bring in a national government. Or the American way is just blow up all the schools, businesses and train Iraqis to kill each other and then tell everyone that Saddam is a bigger criminal then themselves.

Free Trade is also dying because the US wants to control the global economy.

And Steve Irwin the Crocadile Hunter is dead. I can no longer write parodies of him in Star Wars, James Bond, or Snakes On A Plane. I'll miss the most entertaining and rambunctious character in real life and television.  

"My favorite metaphor.  Consider the "clipboard" on the Mac, PC or XWindows.  It's just like a regular clipboard, except (a) you can't see it, (b) it holds only one object, (c) whatever you put there destroys the previous contents.  Aside from that, IT'S JUST LIKE A REGULAR CLIPBOARD IN EVERY OTHER RESPECT-- EXCEPT THERE AREN'T ANY OTHER RESPECTS!

This is called a "metaphor".*  I see this pseudo-clipboard as stupidity at its height: a really terrible, destructive mechanism, excused by a word that makes it sound somehow okay.  It is a further offense-- the greatest atrocity in the computer field, I believe-- that the crippled and destructive functions of this pseudo-clipboard have been falsely given the names "cut" and "paste"-- which for decades have meant something ENTIRELY different to writers, the function of parallel rearrangement with all things visible." Ted Nelson

www.xanadu.com.au/ted/TN/WRITINGS/TCOMPARADIGM/tedCompOneLiners.html 

"A society that can brush off as unimportant an army officer’s brutal murder of a 13-year-old girl on the claim that she threatened soldiers at a military post -- one of nearly 700 Palestinian children murdered by Israelis since the intifada began -- is not a society with a conscience."

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This reminds me of a scene in V For Vendetta. Remember when that little girl put on V's mask? V was a guy who realized that there must be a change in government. Not just political leaders but the whole structure. The whole ideologoy, philosphy everything.

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"A government that imprisons a 15-year-old girl -- one of several hundred children in Israeli detention -- for the crime of pushing and running away from a male soldier trying to do a body search as she entered a mosque is not a government with any moral bearings. (This story, not the kind that ever appears in the U.S. media, was reported in the London Sunday Times. The girl was shot three times as she ran away and was convicted to 18 months in prison after she came out of a coma.)"

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Next thing you know Kathleen Christison will say Israeli soldiers planted bombs and blamed Palestine, or that Israeli soldiers pretended to Canadians with fake Canadian passporst...But I'll give her a little more room.

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"But it needs to be said now, loudly: those who devise and carry out Israeli policies have made Israel into a monster, and it has come time for all of us -- all Israelis, all Jews who allow Israel to speak for them, all Americans who do nothing to end U.S. support for Israel and its murderous policies -- to recognize that we stain ourselves morally by continuing to sit by while Israel carries out its atrocities against the Palestinians."

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Okay, she didn't mention the stuff I that I thought she would. It's interesting how the media shape and edit the story to make it pro Israel. If you recall, our media is pro Jewish, isn't the guy from Rogers Communications and the guy from Global both Jewish? I remember a Native not getting his story in the editorial because it went against the president of Global...I forget his name right now, but some of you might know and remember.

http://www.counterpunch.org/christison07172006.html This is the link, and at the bottom is her email address in case you want her to sue me for stealing the article.