Katrina hearings expose cronyism

Former head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency Michael Brown appeared in front of a congressional committee on Tuesday. The hearing intended to find out what went wrong with the response to Hurricane Katrina. Brown resigned after public outrage over bad preparation and equally bungled rescue missions in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. It was therefore quite surprising to see him cast most of the blame onto local and state authorities claiming they had not formally asked for help. The fact is, they did, and FEMA largely ignored it.

A letter addressed to President George W. Bush via FEMA clearly outlines the requests. Dated Aug. 28 and signed by Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco, it asks for an “expedited major disaster to be declared” for the “state of Louisiana.” The letter then goes on to specify the “affected areas” should “include all the southeastern parishes, including the city of New Orleans.”

Most importantly, Blanco wrote, “Based on the predictions we have received from the National Weather Service and other sources, I have determined this incident will be of such severity and magnitude that effective response will be beyond the capabilities of the state and the affected local governments and that supplementary federal assistance will be necessary.”
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Lessons learned from IRA situation helpful elsewhere

In July the Irish Republican Army officially called an end to its struggle to oust British interests from the Irish isle. The organization, or precursors of it, had been fighting against the British for most of the last century and regularly resorted to acts of terrorism.

This makes the declaration about ending its “armed campaign” quite significant. It marks one of the few instances where a violent struggle between two interest groups has, for the most part, been put to rest. Any government finding itself in a similar situation should try to learn as much as it can from the situation.

There have been other instances when an end to the struggle seemed close, but it never fully materialized. Monday the result of a study conducted by the British government confirmed the IRA had indeed given up all its weapons as planned. This finding makes it likely that this time it’s for real.

The IRA had been bombing British targets. ranging from pubs frequented by British citizens to media installations such as the BBC headquarters in London to government buildings. The IRA’s tactics were similar to many — if not most — other organizations that employ terrorism as tactic to further its causes.
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England found guilty of Iraq abuse

I guess we are supposed to put everything concerning this case to rest now?

It simply does not add up. There was more to Abu Ghraib than a few low-ranking soldiers “having some fun.”

IRA ‘has destroyed all its arms’

The IRA has put all of its weapons beyond use, the head of the arms decommissioning body has said.

General John de Chastelain made the announcement at a news conference accompanied by the two churchmen who witnessed the process.

“We are satisfied that the arms decommissioned represent the totality of the IRA’s arsenal.”BBC

Exit strategy desperately needed for Iraq

Details are emerging about the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq beginning in May next year. This is hardly surprising, as the British government has hinted at it before. But Japanese officials have indicated that once Britain leaves, they may feel forced to do the same, compounding the problem of keeping order in Iraq with even less troops. All this makes it even more painfully obvious that an exit strategy simply does not exist.

The same night British Prime Minister Tony Blair barely won his re-election earlier this year in May, he said British voters had spoken and his government has “got to listen to the people and respond wisely and sensibly.” This included changing some very unpopular policies, including support for the war in Iraq. The statement clearly translated into Britain wanting to pull out sooner rather than later.

Even though it has been months since Blair made the statement, the United States government has changed little and remains adamant about troop levels. President George W. Bush and others continue to substitute actual military and foreign policy strategy with the same empty platitude: Stay the course.

The U.S. president may be the commander in chief of one of the planet’s most formidable armies, but even he cannot force Iraqi resistance fighters who are prepared to die into submission purely by willpower.

According to the New York Times, Prince Saud al-Faisal, the Saudi foreign minister, said on Thursday that Iraq was heading for “disintegration,” a euphemism for civil war. Coming from what is arguably the administration’s closest ally, this is a bleak warning of things to come.
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Guantanamo inmate says US told him to spy on al-Jazeera

The US military told an al-Jazeera cameraman being held at Guantánamo Bay that he would be released as long as he agreed to spy on journalists at the Arabic news channel, according to documents seen by the Guardian.

The journalist has been in the prison without charge for three-and-a-half years after being accused by the US of being a terrorist, allegations he denies. He claims that he has been interrogated more than 100 times but not asked about alleged terrorist offences. Instead, Sami Muhyideen al-Hajj says US military personnel have alleged during interrogation that al-Jazeera has been infiltrated by al-Qaida and that one of its presenters is linked to Islamists.Guardian

Let’s get this straight: U.S. intelligence is trusting this guy enough to send him to the “enemy,” which incidentally is one of the few free press agencies that exist in the Middle East. Yet the same guy is being held at Guantanamo Bay because, as the administration has repeatedly pointed out in the past, all the inmates that are still being held are considered a security risk.

So much for civil liberties for everyone.

Two iPods for Iraq

An extraordinary appeal to Americans from the Bush administration for money to help pay for the reconstruction of Iraq has raised only $600 (£337), The Observer has learnt. Yet since the appeal was launched earlier this month, donations to rebuild New Orleans have attracted hundreds of millions of dollars.

The public’s reluctance to contribute much more than the cost of two iPods to the administration’s attempt to offer citizens ‘a further stake in building a free and prosperous Iraq’ has been seized on by critics as evidence of growing ambivalence over that country.

This coincides with concern over the increasing cost of the war. More than $30 billion has been appropriated for the reconstruction. Initially, America’s overseas aid agency, USaid, expected it to cost taxpayers no more than $1.7bn, but it is now asking the public if they want to contribute even more.

It is understood to be the first time that a US government has made an appeal to taxpayers for foreign aid money. Contributors have no way of knowing who will receive their donations or even where they may go, after officials said details had be kept secret for security reasons. The Observer

Storm slacks, Bush works

As the hurricane slackened and moved north, officials took stock of the damage in its wake. New York Times

Role reversal, I guess.

Britain to pull troops from Iraq in May, Japan may follow

British troops will start a major withdrawal from Iraq next May under detailed plans on military disengagement to be published next month, The Observer can reveal.
The document being drawn up by the British government and the US will be presented to the Iraqi parliament in October and will spark fresh controversy over how long British troops will stay in the country. Tony Blair hopes that, despite continuing and widespread violence in Iraq, the move will show that there is progress following the conflict of 2003.

Britain has already privately informed Japan - which also has troops in Iraq - of its plans to begin withdrawing from southern Iraq in May, a move that officials in Tokyo say would make it impossible for their own 550 soldiers to remain.

(…) The disclosures follow rising demands for the government to establish a clearer strategy for bringing troops home following the kidnapping of two British SAS troopers in Basra and the scenes of violence that surrounded their rescue. Last week Blair’s own envoy to Iraq, Sir Jeremy Greenstock, warned that Britain could be forced out if Iraq descends so far into chaos that ‘we don’t have any reasonable prospect of holding it together’.The Observer

I’ll save the White House the time: Stay the course. 9/11. Freedom. 9/11. No timetable. 9/11. God bless America.

NYT: Saudi Warns U.S. Iraq May Face Disintegration (read: civil war imminent)

Prince Saud al-Faisal, the Saudi foreign minister, said Thursday that he had been warning the Bush administration in recent days that Iraq was hurtling toward disintegration, a development that he said could drag the region into war.

“There is no dynamic now pulling the nation together,” he said in a meeting with reporters at the Saudi Embassy here. “All the dynamics are pulling the country apart.” He said he was so concerned that he was carrying this message “to everyone who will listen” in the Bush administration. New York Times

Abu Ghraib inquiry left many questions open

The retrial of Pfc. Lynndie England, one of the American soldiers who was photographed in Iraq mistreating detainees, is well under way, and even her lawyer has admitted that England will likely receive several years in prison. She is one of only a few who face such a sentence. This only shows once more that the incidents at Abu Ghraib (Wiki link), an American-run prison in Iraq, have not been investigated as far reaching as one could have hoped for.

The theory of a “few bad apples” being responsible for the mistreatment of prisoners without any wrongdoing or knowledge of their superiors had been questioned from the beginning.

Documents have been grudgingly declassified and have shown that in several instances Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld himself had been informed of the conditions and “techniques” used at the prison. Yet, he did nothing until after the images were released.

Other military personnel, such as Capt. Donald Reese, have claimed that the CIA had been involved, and Abu Ghraib had only been one of many locations where detainees were interrogated with “force.”

The claim was backed up by the fact that several detainees in Abu Ghraib had been “ghosts,” a term used by the CIA to signify a prisoner who was held without any record. At least one of such “ghosts” died after being beaten by guards.
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CNN Poll: Fewer than half think U.S. will win in Iraq

A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll released Thursday indicated fewer than half of Americans believe the United States will win the Iraq war, and 55 percent of those surveyed said it should speed up withdrawal plans.

Only 21 percent said the United States definitely would win the war in Iraq, which began when a U.S.-led coalition invaded in 2003 to topple Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. Another 22 percent said they thought the United States probably would win.

Twenty percent of respondents said the United States was capable of winning in Iraq — but probably would not. And 34 percent said they considered the war unwinnable. CNN

Student expelled for having gay parents

Doesn’t this just warm your heart?

A 14-year-old student was expelled from a Christian school because her parents are lesbians, the school’s superintendent said in a letter.

Shay Clark was expelled from Ontario Christian School on Thursday.

“Your family does not meet the policies of admission,” Superintendent Leonard Stob wrote to Tina Clark, the girl’s biological mother.

Stob wrote that school policy requires that at least one parent may not engage in practices “immoral or inconsistent with a positive Christian life style, such as cohabitating without marriage or in a homosexual relationship,” The Los Angeles Times reported in Friday’s edition.

Stob could not be reached for comment by the newspaper. Shay and her parents said they won’t fight the ruling.

School administrators learned of the parents’ relationship this week after Shay was reprimanded for talking to the crowd during a football game, Tina Clark said.

Clark and her partner have been together 22 years and have two other daughters, ages 9 and 19. AP

Just as a reminder: Nobody expects the spanish inquisition!

New Orleans levee again overpowered by storm surge

CNN is reporting one of the levees that were overpowered by Hurricane Katrina, flooding New Orleans, has “broken” again.

A CNN photojournalist reported that the water was at least two-feet deep in the ward and was rising quickly.

The Army Corps of Engineers disputed that, saying water was overtopping the Industrial Canal levee but the barrier was still intact. The Corps is “not worried right now,” spokesman Mitch Frazier said.
Dana Finney, an Army Corps of Engineers spokeswoman, said an 8-foot storm surge caused the water to rush over the levee.

The corps will put rescue boats in the water as a precaution, Lt. Gen. Russel Honore said. Helicopters have been grounded by Hurricane Rita’s strengthening winds. CNN

Best. RNC. Ever. Dude.

John Lennon was dismissed as a Communist threat to the US only because he was always stoned, secret FBI papers revealed yesterday.

The ex-Beatles singer was thought to be a ringleader of revolutionaries plotting to hijack a Republican conference, the documents show. This is London

Just how would this be different from a “normal” Republican convention, though?

Now at a grocery check-out line near you: Bush drinking again

Faced with the biggest crisis of his political life, President Bush has hit the bottle again, The National Enquirer can reveal.

Bush, who said he quit drinking the morning after his 40th birthday, has started boozing amid the Katrina catastrophe.

Family sources have told how the 59-year-old president was caught by First Lady Laura downing a shot of booze at their family ranch in Crawford, Texas, when he learned of the hurricane disaster.

His worried wife yelled at him: “Stop, George.”

For those who don’t know this paper, it’s less than remotely respectable. But still, I doubt carpeting U.S. grocery check-out lines with this on the title page will help Bush’s approval ratings. Especially when it contains golden lines like this:

Age 26 in 1972, he reportedly rounded off a night’s boozing with his 16-year-old brother Marvin by challenging his father to a fight.

Sounds like a Saturday Night Live skit waiting to happen. Read the story here.

Record labels becoming too greedy, again

One of the few instances where the music industry did right in recent years was the introduction of Apple’s iTunes Music Store. Hesitant at first, the five major labels eventually agreed to have their music offered online for $1 a track, a price point consumers accepted. The labels make most of the profit from the store’s sales, even though they are not involved in any of the technological hurdles an online store has to tackle on a daily basis. The labels actually make a higher profit per track from iTMS than if they sold the same tracks on CD, as production, shipping and other costs largely do not apply to digitally sold music. Yet, the labels are now doing their best to ruin a good business model by becoming too greedy.
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We love everyone (Except gays…)

Homosexuals, even those who are celibate, will be barred from becoming Roman Catholic priests, a church official said Wednesday, under stricter rules soon to be released on one of the most sensitive issues facing the church.

The official, said the question was not “if it will be published, but when,” referring to the new ruling about homosexuality in Catholic seminaries, a topic that has stirred much recent rumor and worry in the church. The official, who has authoritative knowledge of the new rules, spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the church’s policy of not commenting on unpublished reports.

He said that while Pope Benedict XVI had not yet signed the document, it would probably be released in the next six weeks. New York Times

Evacuees of One Storm Flee Another in Texas

Just like last summer in Orlando:

Hurricane Rita prompted a mandatory evacuation of (Houston’s) public shelters on Tuesday, emptying them as quickly as they had filled just three weeks ago and sending still-dazed survivors of Hurricane Katrina packing off to Arkansas, to the bus terminal, to the airport and, for some who considered themselves lucky, to paid and furnished apartments here in the Houston area.
New York Times

Even the pope is not above the law

In the late 1990s the Roman Catholic Church was entangled in sexual abuse cases involving underage children. It has been a while since the scandals made the headlines, but the details behind the scandals still remain largely unknown. What’s worse, since there is indication that high-ranking members of the church attempted to hush up the affair, it is uncertain whether safeguards have been put into place to stop such deplorable incidents from occurring again.

Yet the U.S. government does not only seem disinterested in a matter that concerns the abuse of United States citizens, it may now actively hamper a pending case that has the power to shed light on the matter once and for all.

A lawsuit in Texas aimed at investigating if and how high-ranking members of the church were involved in covering up the sexual abuse of three boys received quite a damper from the federal government. In a statement released Monday by Assistant Attorney General Peter Keisler, it was stated that Pope Benedict XVI could not be implicated in the case even though sources persistently named him as a figure instrumental in stonewalling investigations when he was still a cardinal and close associate of the late Pope John Paul II.
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U.S. Military Deaths Top 1,900 in Iraq

Just for the record:

The war in Iraq passed a sobering milepost Tuesday when U.S. officials reported 10 more Americans were killed — six of them members of the armed forces, raising to more than 1,900 the number of U.S. service members who have died in the country since the invasion.
AP

Pope immune from U.S. abuse lawsuit

Because the U.S. would never do anything to tick off a foreign “head of state.”

The United States government has told a Texas court that Pope Benedict XVI should be given immunity from a lawsuit accusing him of conspiring to cover up the sexual molestation of three boys by a seminarian, court documents show.

Assistant attorney general Peter Keisler said in Monday’s filing that, as pope, Benedict enjoys immunity as the head of a state - the Vatican. He said allowing the lawsuit to proceed would be “incompatible with the United States’ foreign policy interests”. SA

So if I get some british Earl the give me the right to call a part of his landholdings “Sebania” the U.S. would have to stop ticking me off? Sounds like a plan to me.

Return to moon a worthy goal

NASA outlined a strategy Monday that would put humans back on the moon as early as 2018, a proposal meant as a first stage to manned space flights exploring our solar system.

One of the first questions that come to mind is, “Why did it take so long?” The last time a human walked on a surface other than our own planet’s was in the early ’70s.

The question that will likely be debated more hotly is, “How are we going to pay for it?” What most forget is that the returns on such a mission in terms of scientific research and technological advances would - fittingly – be astronomically high.

When President John F. Kennedy vowed in May 1961, “this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to Earth,” nobody knew for sure if it was even possible. Yet the nation took on what is probably one of humanity’s greatest undertakings ever: exploration of space.

As a reward humans took their first steps on a historically important exploration to the stars, but in the process spawned an entire industry fueled by advances and inventions made in the space program. Computers, plastics and other “space-age” technologies all made considerable advancements during these early space flights, often in ways that had not been foreseen but were always beneficial.

What started as a “space race” between the Soviet Union and the United States quickly evolved away from the nationalistic undertones that had caused the initial spark of research. In later years the space program helped bring about cooperation between Soviet Russia and the United States.

Such cooperation continues to this day and made construction of the International Space Station possible. The space station itself is probably the first truly neutral ground on which scientists from all corners of the globe can work side by side. The diplomatic benefit of such projects is priceless in and of itself.
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Pool overhauled while buildings crumble further

In Friday’s Oracle, University of South Florida students read this quote: “Everything ages, and with other schools, their facilities and the things they can offer their students (are up to date). We need to have the most up-to-date offerings as well.” Students may have hoped the quote concerned the crumbling Fine Arts building or crowded conditions in the School of Architecture. But instead, the quote referred to one of USF’s outdoor pools.
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