Day: April 1, 2014

The Results Are In!

Remember back to the days when we were having the torture debate?  Some said it was necessary while others said it was cruel and unusual for Americans to participate n such……Recall all that?

Let’s fast forward to the days after the death of Bil Laden (considering that you are not on the same wave length as the idiots that think he is still alive) and all the people that supported enhanced interrogation came running to the nearest microphone to claim it was their techniques that made all the success in finding and ultimately killing good old OBL….remember all that?

There was argument upon argument about the usefulness of the intel gathered by extreme interrogations……I am sure that many of them will not be running to a camera to claim this report….

The report that has thrown the CIA into abitterfight with the Senate Intelligence Committee concludes that there is no evidence that torture helped the agency find Osama bin Laden, congressional aides and other sources tell the AP. The CIA has argued that “harsh interrogation techniques” like waterboarding provided vital information; Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, for example, confirmed that he knew al-Qaeda courier Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti after he’d been waterboarded. But he made the admission months after the waterboarding, the Senate report finds, while Mohammed was under standard interrogation.

Even then, the information he provided wasn’t important and didn’t include the courier’s true name; the report concludes it served only to confirm what the CIA already knew. False information given by another tortured detainee related to the courier, which the CIA has argued was a tell-tale sign he was trying to protect al-Kuwati, turned out to be similarly unimportant, per the report. The AP notes that it took the CIA years to ascertain al-Kuwati’s real name, Sheikh Abu Ahmed; it’s still unclear how the agency did so. Writing for the Wire, Philip Bump observes that “it’s impossible to overestimate the significance of the bin Laden capture in the defense of the CIA’s interrogation programs … which is no doubt part of the reason that the Senate staffers spoke with the AP.”

Sorry….the results are in…….and the torture in the extreme was of little to no help……..

What say you?

Tweedle-dee, Tweedle-Dum And Tweedle-dumber

Geopolitics is so much more interesting than watching the absolute morons we have for our representation……so guess what?  I will stick with interesting, anytime.

With all the goings on in the world we can always count on the one person in Washington that will talk about anything at anytime…..John McCain and then there is his com-padre, Lindsey Graham and you know I have noticed that when those two have something incredibly stupid to say or propose there is one that is not far behind, Kelly Ayotte……she is an added feature to the foreign policy clowns….Bozo in training…..

So far there has not been much that would enforce the belief in some Benghazi cover up…….that is if you are not into the conspiracy BS……..but that never stopped a war hawk from doing what they do best….NOTHING!

And these days it is business as usual……

A trio of Republican senators is pushing for a special committee to investigate the 2012 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi that left four Americans dead.

“We are once again calling for the appointment of a Joint Select Committee to investigate the terrorist attacks on our compounds in Benghazi,” said Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), John McCain (R-AZ) and Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) in a statement Monday. “It is imperative that we learn everything that happened before, during and after the attacks. A Joint Select Committee should be established.”

The push comes as House Democrats are demanding that House Oversight Committee Chair Darrell Issa (R-CA) give up his year-and-a-half long probe into purported Obama administration mischief over the attack. Democrats accuse Issa of pursuing a witch hunt aimed at tarnishing the president and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ahead of a possible 2016 presidential run. To date, there isn’t evidence to implicate Clinton or senior White House officials in wrongdoing.

Do you think we could go one week without stupidity?

Good God….do these f*ckers ever listen to themselves?

Iraq Will Escalate?

Inkwell Institute

Middle East Desk

Iraq has all but slipped from America’s collected memory…..out of sight….out of mind……but Iraq is far from being that shining example of democracy in the Middle East……and was not that the promise?

Violence is running rampant……elections are upcoming and NO one knows what the results will bring………but other than that what is happening in Iraq….I mean now that Americans have forgotten everything that had happened………

However, political divisions, in combination with a weak state and high unemployment, make Iraq one of the most unstable countries in the Middle East. The country remains deeply scarred by the brutal civil war (2006-08) that has poisoned relations between Iraq’s religious communities for generations to come.

The central government in the capital Baghdad is now dominated by the Shiite Arab majority (about 60% of total pop.), and many Sunni Arabs – who formed the backbone of Saddam Hussein’s regime – feel marginalized.

Iraq’s Kurdish minority, on the other hand, enjoys a strong autonomy in the north of the country, with its own government and security forces. The Kurds are at odds with the central government over the division of oil profits and the final status of mixed Arab-Kurdish territories.

There is still no consensus on what the post-Saddam Iraq should look like. Most Kurds advocate a federal state (and many wouldn’t mind seceding from the Arabs altogether if given a chance), joined by some Sunnis who want autonomy from the Shiite-led central government. Many Shiite politicians living in oil-rich provinces could also live without the interference from Baghdad. On the other side of the debate are the nationalists, both Sunni and Shiites, who advocate a unified Iraq with a strong central government.

Al Qaeda-linked Sunni extremists continue with regular attacks against government targets and Shiites. The potential for economic development is huge, but violence remains endemic, and many Iraqis fear the return of civil war and a possible partition of the country.  (thanx to ask.com)

And those are the finer points.

While the situation in Iraq is spiraling quickly…..the major issue that could the most trouble is Kurdistan…….

Kurdistan Pas News Agency quoted the head of the Goran Movement, Nawshirwan Mustafa, as confirming that Barzani had told him that he would seek to announce an independent state of Kurdistan within two years. The contentious claims have created controversy across Iraq ahead of the country’s third parliamentary elections, scheduled for the end of April.

A senior Kurdish political figure, speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat on the condition of anonymity, confirmed the reports on Wednesday. The source affirmed that during a meeting at the Goran Movement’s Suleimaniya-based headquarters, Mustafa had said that a potential independent Kurdish state “was discussed as an option

Speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat, Iraqiya bloc MP Talal Hassan Al-Zoubai said: “Iraq today is closer to a confederation rather than a federal government.”

“A federal government cannot order the [Kurdistan] region to do anything . . . the problem is that the Iraqi constitution gives precedence to the regions and the provinces over the central government—a thing which made Iraqi Kurdistan develop on all levels so that it became more significant than the center,” he continued. “Iraq today is made up of regions, the Kurds being most powerful on all levels, including the Peshmerga’s military strength, economy and investment.”

And there is the rub…….Kurdistan….that will be more contentious than the rise of ISIS…….this could spell the end of a “free and democratic” Iraq.

Well done, America.