Iraq now seems utterly beyond US control and it is clear the White House and the Pentagon have no idea what to do next. Not only is it obvious they have no idea what to do next nor how to do it, they don't even know what it is they've already done: Iraqis tortured in Abu Graib prison for months and no one at the Pentagon knew it was happening, or at least, won't own up to it. The outrageous displays of incompetence and delinquency are staggering in complexity. We here at the BHC have devoted some time to try a get a wrapping around the mess but it is not entirely clear to anyone if that is even possible. The Canadian government doesn't want to offend any neighbours, like anyone is paying any attention with all the other crap going on, and National Public Radio disappoints the public.

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FUBAR Fallujah

When White House neocons began their preordained march into Iraq it was done under the pretense of ridding the world of Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction. He was a danger and an imminent threat. Well, that didn't work out so well (and they never used the word imminent!) so they had to shunt their reasoning onto the "he's just a bad guy" track. The real reason for invasion likely always was regime change: he just wasn't doing what the White House wanted done and hadn't for years, but, as a reason for war, that wasn't going to fly with the international community. The UN is disinclined from invasion of sovereign nations when the only reason is government badness. Well, what to do...what to do...? Screw the UN, invade anyway and hope to hell some torture chambers and mass graves are found. Yes, that will certainly be all the proof the White House will need to justify the unprecedented act of American pre-emptive war. Indeed, such things were found. Yes, Saddam was a very very bad man: killing and torturing Iraqis.

Invade the US did, with banal Tony Blair in tow. After over a year of fighting in Iraq, "Coalition of the Willing" forces have killed untold thousands of Iraqis, and, it now comes forth, have been torturing them, too. Yes, those dreadful images of beaten and humiliated Iraqis in Abu Ghraib prison have revealed an occupation force seemingly no better than the Baathist thugs from whom the US claimed they were saving Iraqis. Not surprisingly, Donald Rumsfeld has offered a quibbling statement questioning whether the photographs expose a regimen of torture or just run-of-the-mill abuse. Should readers be inclined to give the estimable Secretary of Defense (and what a new meaning he has imputed to that office) the benefit of the doubt, they may read the list of some of those "abuses" from the Taguba report, commissioned by the senior US military official in Iraq, General Ricardo Sanchez and delivered to him in February, 2004. A massive ass-covering has ensued at the Pentagon and the White House wherein the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Richard Myers, has claimed he has not seen the Taguba report, an admission which seems to carry with it the implication that his ignorance lets him off the hook. That's right, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff cannot be bothered to read a report submitted three months ago which describes systemic failure of the prison system administered by US forces in Iraq. Bush then stands up and asks, since Myers hasn't seen the report, how can he be expected to know anything? Their ignorance of this situation, something about which they clearly should not be ignorant, is being offered up to vindicate...their ignorance of the situation! This truly is blundering of epic proportion. And just to top things off with an inane and flavourless cherry, in waltzes Republican senator Chuck Hagel (R. Nb) and dismisses the folderol by declaring that war is hell and "atrocities happen".

All this comes on the heels of the worsening temper of Fallujah, which the Army, and then the Marines, have been incapable of controlling, having been restricted from employing overwhelming force and decimating the city. Fortunately, someone sensible realises that that is just not the way one invests a foreign land with freedom and democracy: pounding it into submission. Unfortunately, it seems quite clear that we have advanced well beyond that boundry anyway. So, the US Marines are withdrawing from Fallujah to be replaced by quickly, and likely inadequately, trained Iraqi soldiers, the very same kind which turned tail the last time fighting amped up in the city. Insanely, this "Fallujah Brigade" was to be commanded by former Hussein Republican Guard general, Jassim Muhammad Salih. This should certainly strike everyone as about as preposterous as things could get: US forces torturing Iraqis in Saddam Hussein's former torture chambers and appointing a former Hussein henchman general to command a hurriedly composed group of Iraqis to quell the violence in Fallujah. This scrambling to recompose some kind of Iraqi armed force is the direct result of the disbanding of the original Iraqi army, part of that grand plan the White House and Pentagon so cleaverly devised before the invasion. Fortunately, someone in Washington recognised the absurdity of all this and quickly reappointed General Muhammad Latif, a former intelligence officer, native of Baghdad and long-time opponent of Saddam Hussein. However, Abu Graib has certainly stuck a fork in things and all such maneuvering is too little, too late. Reports abound of the outrage percolating throughout the Arab world and we here at the BHC now fear that things have been so mismanaged, indeed, not managed at all, any hope of recovering the Iraq debacle from the pits of an uncontrollable hell may now be completely lost. And remember, the White House still plans to hand over this mess to some heretofore unnamed, unknown interim Iraqi administration on June 30.

The White House and the Pentagon have continually failed to recognize just how foreign Iraq is to American ideals and vice versa. The Arab world has always been suspicious of the United States' agenda in the middle east and after the revelation of Abu Ghraib, that world is now convinced that American ideals are as corrupt as any they may have imagined.

With all this going on, what are we hearing from Bush? Nothing but meaningless spit that the tattered situation in Iraq is actually "improving" and that the US is determined to bring "freedom and democracy" to Iraqis, still. Just where is that man, anyway? Now we all know Bush doesn't read the newspapers. He has said as much. But really, George, try reading something. In an effort to quell foaming Arab anger, unprecendented displays of marginal contrition have been coming out of Bush and Rumsfeld: yes, these are horrible deeds done by a few bad seeds. It won't happen again. Ok? The Daily Show bitingly pointed out that what Bush has been saying to the Arab world about Abu Graib is something akin to "just because we did it, doesn't mean we would do it."


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Streaming Media

Bush/Cheney appeared before the 9/11 commission last week but not much is known about what was asked or answered. That's because the session was not broadcast nor was it recorded in any way; this to the specifications of the White House. In fact, the White House demanded that any notes taken by the interviewers would have to be vetted to ensure that "national security" would not be compromised, as though that has not happened already with those two chimps at the helm. So, what does a newspaper write about when there is nothing to write about? The New York Times managed to fill a few columns with some para-eloquent prose which had the staff at the BHC rolling in the isles:

Administration officials said the president and vice president were seated in wing-back chairs in front of the Oval Office fireplace, with the commission members seated on a pair of couches and several wooden chairs in an informal semicircle around them, the day's strong sunlight streaming in from the windows behind them.

Well, isn't that lovely? How comforting. When one is investigating the most horrifying attack on US soil resulting from the most egregious failure of American intelligence in history, wing-back chairs and streaming sunlight are always nice.

They said intelligence warnings they received throughout 2001 suggested that Al Qaeda was poised to strike overseas, not on American soil

Lately, the NY Times has had some decent coverage and some strong opinionating regarding the shafting of America but the authors of this story, Shenon and Sanger, felt a need to wax poetic since they, the commisson and Bush/Cheney apparently failed to recall the Aug. 6, 2001 PDB entitled, "Bin Ladin determined to strike in U.S."

The BHC imagines that the apparent contradiction of Bush/Cheney's statement can be resolved, depending on what the meaning of "in" is.


Read about nuthin'....

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No Canada!

It would seem that the Canadian government, in its constant, striving need to not offend anyone except Canadians, has decided that it cannot support the Canadian ship building industry after a $2.1 billion contract for three new navy ships was announced recently. The BHC cannot imagine any rational argument which would posit that military vessels should not be built by the country for whose military the ships are meant. But rational argument is nothing that senior Canadian government officials generally concern themselves with and they argue that the federal government cannot pursue a "buy-Canadian" policy because that would be seen as unfairly supporting Canadian industry.

The BHC is going to churn that through our handy, dandy, federal government phrase demangler: the Canadian government cannot and should not be biased in using Canadian industry to build its own military infrastructure. Now, it is one thing if a country doesn't actually have an industry capable of buidling what is needed, but when the maritime country, Canada, which does have a strong ship building industry, does not recognise that it is perfectly appropriate that its federal government purchase Canadian-made products for its own military, something just ain't right in Ottawa.

The BHC recommends that any Canadian industries so affected by such policies ought to reposition themselves at tax time and declare that such payments would be seen as unfairly supporting Canadian government.


Canuck reasoning....

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Chuckin' Bob

Bob Edwards, long time host of NPR's Morning Edition sounds pretty ticked off about his abrupt dismissal from the show. We at the BHC wish we had heard his last show as he apparently tossed a few barbs at NPR management dipshits.

The reasoning of NPR management, like that of the Canadian government, is unfathomable. Jay Kernis, senior vice president for programming, has been heard to have said that the Edwards model "is no longer sufficient to bring the weight of credible, in-depth reporting that we are demanding of ourselves." The Edwards model? He reads the news like every other news reading host of radio morning talk shows! And he has been doing for 25 years with the most sonorous voice in all of broadcasting. Perhaps what NPR clownagement is really saying is that he isn't shock-jockey enough for their "new direction." Millions of outraged listeners called, mailed and emailed their displeasure about the decision, all of which were curtly ignored. Because, when a radio network is on the cutting edge of infotainment, as NPR executives apparently wish they were, one cannot be detered from the "vision" by listeners. Public radio will not be directed by public opinion!


Cheers, Bob.

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