JOB EMERGENCY: U.S. workers are threatened from 4 angles:
--Automation: replacement of our workers by computers/robots (here or overseas);
--'Free Trade' Other countries with very cheap labor can export goods to U.S., underselling goods made by our workers.
--Even corporations that are called 'American' farm out much work to their subordinate firms overseas; a good part of our self-styled 'exports' are goods half worked on here, sent out to be further developed overseas, then imported back here.
--And of course OUTSOURCING; the difference here is that jobs for U.S. college grads, even our techies, are taken by foreigners. A friend who got $75 an hour for advanced computer work was replaced by an Indian working for $7.50 an hour.
=============
The only solution is PROTECTIONISM: technical details can be ignored here; but the principle is simple: all goods sold in America should be largely produced by American workers!

For instance, goods sold here could be taxed heavily; then tax-breaks could be given to firms IN PROPORTION AS THEY SPEND MONEY ON U.S.WORKERS.

As things are now, firms that pay wages/salaries to American workers are penalized in several ways:

--they must pay 6 cents on each dollar put out for our workers (FICA tax).
--they must pay some health-costs for their workers; in other countries, health-costs are paid by all taxpayers, not just by firms hiring local workers! So these foreign firms are helped to undersell our firms.
--Firms that invest in computer/robots now get special tax-breaks.
--Firms that have components overseas are allowed to bring back those profits without paying much tax.
-------------
Now that intelligent college grads are threatened with joblessness ( not just ill-educated textile workers) you'd think there'd be solidarity for Protectionist defenses of U.S. jobs. But I fear that the right-wing pols are so expert at manipulating our voters that such reforms can't happen.

 
WE TRIED TO GOAD SADDAM INTO STRIKING FIRST:
Our bombing of Iraq for years before the invasion was 'legitimized' by our protecting Kurds & Shiites from Saddam, with the 'no-fly' zones.

However now it turns out that Brits & U.S. upped the bombing in '02, in order to goad Saddam into striking first, to legitimize our invasion. (London)TimesOnline
Three reflections:--Obviously the Bushies intended to invade Iraq all along--the WMD and alQuaeda claims were just garnish.
--After bombing Iraq at will for years, why would we assume we'd be welcomed as liberators? Pretty dumb.

--Such a 'strategy' would explain why Bushies now heap insults on N.Korean rulers, and huff and puff about bombing them--to disrupt negotiations with them, and hopefully TO GOAD N.K. INTO A PREEMPTIVE FIRST STRIKE.

On the one hand, such a first-strike by N.K. would slaughter thousands of GIs in a day or so;

but on the other hand it would give the Bushies an excuse to NUKE N.K.off the map.
Why would we want to do this? (N.K. has no oil, or any other resource we'd like to grab!)

--First, N.K. has defied U.S. openly to develop 2d-strike nukes: ("You can destroy our cities; but our survivors can make you regret it.") Bushies don't want this example to spread, to undermine our DarthVader attempt to rule the world.

--Second, Bushies must be frustrated at the way other nations disobey us.They'd like to make our nuke threats more credible by 'playing the crazy card': show we're crazy by nuking an insignificant N.K., and incurring N.K. retaliation vs. our Homeland. (Bushies wouldn't just be PRETENDING to be crazy!)

Actually, other nations are now rushing to develop 2d-strike capacity anyway: those who can't afford nukes will develop germ-war capacities to use against our Homeland.

Of course, 2d-strike deterrents won't work against Bushies if they don't give a damn about awful damage to our Homeland! (They may figure that strikes at our Homeland will make stupid Americans cuddle closer to their Strong Leader!)
--------------
Another aspect of the increased bombing in '02: this was a classic ACT OF WAR, started long before Congress gave its typical weak-kneed, ambiguous authority for war.
Bushies have admitted they were then bombing Saddam's defense facilities, to make invasion easier.
TheNation, cited by TRUTHOUT.

In other words, the Iraq war was clearly UNCONSTITUTIONAL ! Not that it matters, with our castrated Congress, and our courts controlled by Bushies.

Indeed, once Congress authorizes mass-production of robot infantrymen, the Pentagon can stage an open coup.

We've always counted on the fact that American soldiers wouldn't fire on Americans; but American ROBOTS won't hesitate!

Congress and the Courts will then be reduced to openly-impotent agencies, like the Roman Senate under the Empire.

 
BASRA OUT OF CONTROL: The Police Chief here (installed by despised Allawi regime) is a former Saddamite.

Basra is pretty peaceful, but he says that's because it is controlled by two Shiite militia-gangs.He trusts only 25% of his police-force. He says the new Shiite govt. is eliminating some of his best staff, for Saddamite connections.GUARDIAN

This illustrates the hard choice of police leaders between competent former Saddamites and chaotic Shiite leaders.
Pretty dumb to think a Saddamite police chief can control Shiite Basra!

 
ASTONISHING SELF-CENSORSHIP:
A Congressional resolution was proposed this week to demand that Bush offer a plan for our quick withdrawal from Iraq (128 voted for it, including 2/3 of Democrats and 5 Republicans ! For more, see my post on 27May, below.)

This is big news; and it was noted by several foreign papers, and by several online sources--but a search in Google/News reveals that, among U.S. papers, it was mentioned only in Billings,Mont. and in MarinCty,CA!

Once withdrawal is not taboo, is thinkable, its necessity will be obvious. That may be why our mainline press is silent about this resolution.

On holidays like Memorial Day, the disease of war is celebrated more than the death of its victims. That may be part of the explanation of this strange silence.

 
SIX DEAD AT AMERICAN FAST-FOOD RESTAURANT IN PAKISTAN. Apparently this was a response to the recent bombing of a Shiite mosque in Karachi. ADNKRONOS

This is an example of the anti-U.S. rage in so much of the Muslim world. Nobody could sensibly think U.S. bombed the mosque--but the reaction is to attack a U.S. installation. Boston.com

This is also a reminder that Bushies, by making America hated throughout the world, are likely to hurt American exports..e.g KentuckyFriedChicken, the installation destroyed in Karachi.

 
SERIOUSLY WOUNDED GIs are kept for a maximum of 3 days in Iraq, then shipped to Landstuhl Hospital in Germany, then perhaps to U.S. hospitals.

Right now, TWENTY-THREE men a day arrive at the German Hospital from Iraq. During our useless, bloody destruction of Fallujah, over 500 maimed or wounded GIs arrived each day.

Faces lacerated, legs blown off, arms destroyed.
CBS/NEWS
Americans don't count the wounded and maimed, only the dead. However, when this stupid war is over, the dead will lie in the ground, largely forgotten except by their families. But the TENS OF THOUSANDS of maimed and wounded vets, and those with brain injuries or shell-shocked, will be with us for decades, many spending their lives in underfunded Veterans' Hospitals, to remind us of the viciousness of the Bushies, and the stupidity of about 50% of Americans.

However, Americans managed to ignore about 250,000 wounded Viet vets, so they'll likely be able to ignore these also.

 
BUSH WILL GO ON RECRUITING TERRORISTS:

On Memorial Day, Bush announced (a) that his Iraq/Afghanistan wars have made us 'more secure', and (b) that they will continue. FinTimes

The truth is, of course, that our troops in Iraq, by their crude conduct, are recruiting more terrorists from around the world, who are getting trained in guerilla combat and returning 'by the hundreds or THOUSANDS' to their home countries. Some of these will some day be attacking our Homeland.
-------------
An example of this crude conduct, by which our troops are doing more harm than good in Iraq: a top Sunni leader has been advocating that the Sunnis cut the guerilla war and compete politically. Based on their usual goofy intelligence, Americans blew down his door, kept a boot on his neck for 30 minutes, then imprisoned him.
[Assoc.Press, cited in RMtnNews, 31May] See also DetroitFreePress

Later they admitted this was a mistake, and apologized for 'any inconvenience' he suffered. Needless to say, he rejected the apology. Some observers thought this was part of a deliberate U.S. attempt to stir up civil war (Sunni vs. Shiite). But more likely it was just typical U.S. stupidity.
----------
You can bet that terrorist leaders around the world are chuckling in triumph at Bush perseverence in folly.

 
REMEMBER ASSIZ? the guy with the little mustache who was Saddam's spokesman on internatl. media?

He's in prison now, accused of complicity in war-crimes against Kurds, Iran, and Kuwait. FinTimes

Of course, in any crimes vs. Iran (in that earlier war), Rumsfeld was also complicit.

 
WHY THE BIG EMPHASIS ON BAGHDAD?
Observers expect that, even if our new 'offensive' works in Baghdad, the guerillas will simply step up their attacks elsewhere.

Perhaps the Bushies are foreseeing how embarrassing it would be for them to build a $400,000,000 embassy in Baghdad, if it remains a no-mans-land!

Also, the pretence of our new puppet-govt. ruling 'all/Iraq' will seem absurd if our ministers are hiding out (as our previous puppets had to do) in Baghdad's Green Zone.

 
EURO DROPS to $1.25. That threatens U.S. exports (they'll cost more in Europe; and competing European exports will do better throughout the world), and could increase U.S. imports, which will be cheaper for Americans (for instance, more Americans will travel to Euope).

We let our dollar drop in value; but now a cheaper Euro undermines the (very modest) improving effect this has had on our Trade Deficit.

 
Our OTHER war: On Sunday/Monday, 20 casualties from bombs in Afghanistan; also a mortar shell hit Allied HQ in Kabul, causing damage, they say, but no casualties.
REUTERS
We tend to forget that AFTER 3 YEARS of our trying to wipe out Taliban, they are still a danger. While we have far fewer troops in Afghan. than in Iraq, the RATE of U.S. casualties is similar in both places.

 
KOREAN SITUATION GETS MORE TENSE: VP Cheney just insulted N.Korean ruler Kim again (knowing that in Asia, 'saving face' is vital for a ruler.) The Bushies also sent 17 Stealth bombers into South Korea (besides the huge bomber force stationed in Guam.)

Pyongyang responded with a vulgar insult against our SecyOfState Rice--and with a remark that 'preemptive attacks' are possible not just for America. [ InternatlHeraldTribune, 30May ]

(Bushies would be delighted by such a preemptive attack by N.K., destroying Seoul and slaughtering thousands of GIs. That would give them the excuse to nuke N.K. off the map.)

 
127 CASUALTIES MONDAY in a Shiite town, from 2 suicide bombers. (This while our army and native militia have concentrated on wiping out guerillas in Baghdad.) 70 GIs have been killed in May. ABC/NEWS

It's amazing that guerillas never seem to run out of volunteers for suicide bombing !

 
MAD CLARITY? A study from our WarCollege sounds reasonable at first, saying that the Bushies have not offered a clear strategy for our 'war against terror'.

But then it offers 2 alternatives: a) bug out of MiddleEast, or (b) strike at Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iran, & Syria 'and other nations' to 'dry up the wellsprings of terrorism.'
Boston.Com
Note that these awful wellsprings are all enemies of Israel. Indonesia is not mentioned as a possible wellspring of terrorism (242 millions, mainly Muslims getting more and more angry,with jungle islands perfect as staging areas for terrorists.)

This sounds like the rantings of James Woolsey, a Sharonista, a couple of years ago. He said we're in 'World War IV' (the Cold war was WWIII.) And he said we'd have to go after these enemies of Israel.

Considering our fiasco against feckless Iraq, one would not think it even thinkable that we should declare war on these oil-sultans, at a time when oil is going to be permanently scarce.

That's one reason for hoping that our failure in Iraq should be seen clearly by Americans--because if not, the crazy Sharonista Bushies will entangle us in more crazy wars.

 
DOES OUR PUSH FOR ARAB DEMOCRACY ACTUALLY HELP OUR ISLAMIST ENEMIES?

This question is raised by FinTimes,29May. (Full article can be read only by subscribers.)

Well, considering that large majorities of Muslims hate us, it would seem that real majoritarian rule in Muslim countries would set their governments against us! Duh!

 
GUERILLA INTELLIGENCE IMPROVING, admits U.S. intelligence officer. (Our intelligence about them is weak indeed!)

In the last two months, almost 300 car-bombs have exploded. REUTERS

One factor in their improved intelligence may be their infiltration of our native militia. One person warned that they have even infiltrated the MINISTRIES of our new puppet govt.

 
JIHADISTS TRAINED IN BUSH'S WAR:
Bin Laden was trained militarily in the Afghan war vs. the Soviet. Similarly, terrorists are being trained regularly in our Iraq war.This was admitted recently by Bush officials,referring to "a new generation of terrrorists, trained in Iraq in the last couple of years." There is worry over a "bleedout of terrorists of hundreds OR THOUSANDS of Iraq-trained jihadists back to their home countries in MidEast orEurope."
[WashPost]
Bush keeps telling us that his invasion of Iraq has made the world safer from terrorism. In fact, it made us all LESS safe. French journalists held captive for a month by guerillas say they were told that the guerillas wanted Bush re-elected, so trigger-happy U.S. troops would stay on; their slobbish tactics regularly enrage more Iraqis and help recruit (and train) more terrorists.

Bush is the best recruiter world terrorists have .

U.S. troops do more harm than good in Iraq, recruiting more terrorists than they can kill. For Iraq's sake and their own, BRING 'EM HOME!
--------------
GUERILLAS DEFY our move to divide Baghdad into districts, and then station 40,000 native militia and 10,000 U.S. troops around the city, to cut off attacks.
It is specially embarrassing that we haven't been able to cut off attacks in Iraq's CAPITOL CITY ! (So far, we haven't been able to guard the short road from Baghdad to the airport!)

Sunday, guerillas killed 21 people (how many wounded?)
in Baghdad and elsewhere. U.S. ended its 'offensive' in the town of Haditha. USATODAY
-------------
Sadly, a maimed GI was quoted as saying, "We all think that if we don't fight them there, we'll have to fight them here." COLORADOAN If such thinking consoles the victim-GIs, fine!

But as the story above notes, Bush's Iraq project has INCREASED the terrorist-dangers to our Homeland.

 
'THE DOWNING STREET MEMO' SCANDAL:
An amazing 'smoking gun' memo just got leaked in Britain, saying (a) that Bush & Blair were planning Iraq war long before Bush would admit he had made that decision, and (b) that the 'intelligence' was being fixed to justify the war.

The memo is printed, word-for-word, in Ft.CollinsWkly

The Bushies have been silent on this issue except for proForma denials.

So Rep.Conyers is trying to raise thousands of signatures to demand an explanation. You can sign up.
http://www.johnconyers.com/

 
43 Iraqis killed yesterday & today (many more wounded).
660 killed in May so far. ABC/NEWS
--------------
ZARQAWI'S CONDITION? We learned he was wounded only thru guerilla online news; now this line says he's well again (and even more heroic in the eyes of his followers.)

 
FIRST REAL MOVE TOWARD WITHDRAWAL:
123 Representatives (2/3 of Dems, plus 5 GOP!) voted to demand that Bush set forth a plan to withdraw from Iraq!

Before, no pol dared even to suggest withdrawal publicly.

This was a proposed amendment to the vote for Four Hundred and Ninety-One thousand MILLIONS of dollars for the Pentagon next year. That budget passed.
cited by GlobalPolicyForum

Now the Pentagon budget FAR EXCEEDS our federal deficit. We spend almost as much on WAR each year as THE REST OF THE WORLD'S NATIONS, COMBINED.

(Yet a bunch of Iraqi primitives can stall our mighty war machine.)
----------
Another source said the 'get out' Congressional vote was 128, with 5 members not voting. One 'get out' vote was from one of the strongest earlier advocates of the war. Disappointingly, Rep.Udall of Colo. voted on the wrong side.
Online.com

 
[This piece was inspired by a mention of St.Thomas More by my friend Gerald L. Baker, also from Cresco,Iowa.
For his blog, click on http://www.livejournal.com/users/reykr/
-------------------------------
I am a fanatic fan of Thomas More. When I visited England in the 1950s, I went immediately to Canterbury to pray at the shrine where his head is kept. (I was super-devout.)

(It was customary to let executed criminals' heads rot on the stake. But someone persuaded HenryVIII that HE'd be the one shamed if he did that to More, one of Europe's great literati.

So it was arranged that More's daughter, Margaret Roper, would go under the bridge in a boat; the head was thrown down to her, then buried in a vault at St.Dunstan's church in Canterbury.The body of course was destroyed with quicklime, so no relics.)

More's co-martyr was St.John Fisher. Someone told Henry that the Pope had named Fisher cardinal 'in pectore', secretly.Henry replied,"Well,they'll have to put his cardinal's hat on his shoulders, because I mean to have his head!"
------------
More was beheaded because he refused to agree that the King was the Head of the Church in England. That was remarkable, because the Papacy was then rather discredited: recently there had been THREE RIVAL POPES! and the current Pope, Leo X, 'ran the Papacy as if it were a bank". (He was big on selling indulgences).

More read Greek (and trained his daughters to read Greek!) So, like Erasmus, he could read the NewTestament in the original Greek. Right or wrong, he concluded that Christ had set up Peter (who was later the first bishop of Rome) to head the Church--therefore Peter's successors were in charge of the Church.

(Of course it was easier to be sure that Jesus had NOT meant that awful kings like HenryVIII were to head the Church!) More was that rare instance: a scholar who died for his textual conclusion!
------------
More foresaw that all the (worldly) English bishops would cave in to Henry's demands. He addressed them this way, with an allegory: "There once was a king who swore he would never kill a virgin. But then a virgin offended him.
When counsellors reminded him of his vow, he said,'That's simple: first deflower her, then devour her!'

Well, gentlemen, I may get devoured--but BY GOD, I WILL NOT BE DEFLOWERED!"
------------------------
I named my son Thomas More Lyons. He was never too happy about that, until, in London we saw a big painting honoring More as a hero of Parliamentary independence. Wolsey as Chancellor came over arrogantly to Parliament to demand some concession for the King, and More, as Speaker of the House of Commons, respectfully refused him. He got away with it that time, because the king was crazy about him--then.

Once More and Henry were out riding. More saw that Henry was going crazy with vanity. He said, "Sire, you and I are the most famous people in the kingdom. See that peasant woman there? How much time each week do you think she spends thinking about us?" He got away with that too.

More, Erasmus and friends started the world's first 'peace-movement'. They saw that Henry was loony about taking back Calais from the French..he squandered on that futile war the large fortune amassed by his father. They pointed out that training young nobles to hunt big game was training them to love killing and war.
------------------
More was originally sentenced to be drawn & quartered for high treason. Then word came that,out of the King's mercy, he'd only be beheaded. His comment, "God save my family from the King's Mercy."

There's a play THOMAS MORE that was once thought to contain only a little bit by Shakespeare. But computer-analysis showed he wrote most of it. Best line: A friend regretted he couldn't come visit him just before his execution. More sent back this message: "You'd better come see me today. Tomorrow I'll be elevated so high [on a stake] I won't recognize you at all."

And of course More was famous for his wit at his execution. He told the axman: "Help me up to the scaffold; coming down, I'll shift for myself."
-------------------------
By a happy chance, when I sabbaticalled in Canterbury in 1979-80, our flat was in 'Roper's Subdivision" (formerly the Roper family estate)..St.Dunstan's was just a block away, so I was able to visit the head now and then. (Holy bones & skulls excite Catholics!)The church is now Anglican,of course, but they generously built a Roman chapel for those who want to venerate More's head--(someone said there actually was someone's skull down there in the basement.)

The movie 'MAN FOR ALL SEASONS' was quite accurate historically. The briefest life of More is by his son-in-law: ROPER'S LIFE OF MORE.

The Church didn't canonize him (even though he died a martyr for Papal Supremacy!) till 20th century, because cardinals were scandalized by some passages in his UTOPIA--e.g., engaged couples should get to see each other naked before the wedding.

Just recently there has been a spate of books attacking More. I read them; they did not destroy my admiration for him. (I was upset at the claim that apparently More did approve of burning heretics; but he was very civilized compared to the savagery of other religious leaders of his time, Protestant or Catholic.)

 
GLOATING OVER ZARQAWI'S WOUNDS: U.S. generals hoped out loud that eliminating Zarqawi would notably weaken the Iraq insurgency.TheAustralian

That's possible--especially if his underlings get quarrelling over who succeeds him. On the other hand, Muslims admire martyrs--and Zarqawi dead may inspire the Islamist insurgency anew.
-----------
One 'insurgency' source says that Z. is well and back on duty. But London TIMES claims it was told by an insurgency chief that Z. was seriously injured and has been taken out of Iraq for treatment. Boston.com
--------------------
An Egyptian expert says "There are 50 attacks a day; 80% of them are NOT run by Zarqawi." SCOTSMAN
===============
The main function of the present Iraq assembly is to write a new Constitution. Embarrassingly, only 2 out of 55 members of the writing-committee are Sunnis. But now it seems more Sunnis will be involved. FinTimes

But what counts is if the final Constitution satisfies the Sunni/Arabs so they don't veto it this Autumn. And that satisfaction must result in decreased Sunni support for the guerillas. (For instance, most Iraq oil is in Shiite & Kurd regions. How will Constitution GUARANTEE a 'fair' share of oil-money to the Sunni Arabs?)

The new Constitution must also satisfy the Kurds and the Shiites!

 
KNIVES FOR MONKEYS: A huge anti-Shiite bomb just exploded Friday at a mosque in Pakistan, heightening tensions between the 2 large sects of Muslims.BBC/NEWS
(Such attacks, publicized immediately all over the world, might make a full civil war between Shiites and Sunnis more likely in Iraq.)

Nobel, the inventor of TNT, hoped that his invention would make war so horrible that humans would become pacifists. Instead, bombs have slaughtered millions of humans--and not just with ordinary explosives. U.S. used atom-bombs in Japan, and now half-a-dozen countries have H-bombs, ready to go.

Tom Lehrer's song went this way: " 'The Lord is my Shepherd!' says the Psalm. But just the same, Israel's gotta have the Bomb!" Indeed, Israel now has about 200 nukes.

And of course designer germs for biowar are now available even to nations not advanced enough to obtain nukes. And super-gasses that can't be countered by gas-masks are also available (perhaps to be used vs. our troops in Iraq).

The main cause for our present human tragedy is MEGATECHNOLOGY: lightning-quick technical innovations outstripping--glacially slow--human progress in acquiring prudence.For a general theory of how this imbalance was always inevitable, see ch.1 and 2 of my book DEMOCRACY, RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS (available by Interlibrary Loan, or from ColoStateU Morgan library and library of the philosophy dept.)

Nukes and designer germs in the hands of imperfectly-evolved humans form a much worse danger than knives in the hands of monkeys.

 
SECTARIAN KILLINGS: Sunni guerillas have for some time singled out Shiites for killing (angered that Shiites have largely not joined the insurgency). Zarqawi called the Shiites 'infidels' and called explicitly for their killing.

'Pope' Sistani so far has influenced Shiites not to retaliate vs. Sunnis on a large scale. And even his firebrand rival, Sadr, has been working with Sunnis.

But lately Sunnis have been killed, sometimes by men in the uniforms of our new (Shiite-controlled) regime.
The danger of civil war increases.

(The Shiites are now sealing off Baghdad, in the Sunni/Arab region. This hurts Sunni commercial life, and may signal Sunnis that the new regime will write off Baghdad as Capitol and retreat into the Southern Shiite region.)

 
STUPID ATROCITIES!
Tom Friedman (NYTIMES,27May)points out how our atrocities vs. prisoners in Cuba get broadcast quickly throughout the Muslim world, recruiting new terrorists. What's more, given the reality of such atrocities, Muslims are ready to believe any new, awful story about our atrocities, true or not.

The respected Amnesty Internatl just denounced our Cuba prison as 'the GULAG of our time.' (Gulags were the infamous prison-camps run by the Soviet.) Our Gen.Myers, of course, defended our camp as humane.
USATODAY His denial was aimed at Americans, who want to believe him. But the rest of the world will believe AMNESTY!
-----------
For instance, 7000 Indonesian Muslims (in a population of over 200 million)demonstrated against the allegation that our Guantanamo guards flushed the sacred Koran down a toilet. It doesn't matter whether the story is true, and it certainly didn't help that NEWSWEEK backed down.

Right afterward, U.S. had to close all its Indonesia missions temporarily because of credible warnings of terrorist attacks.

Some cynic said of some national policy, "That's worse than a sin; it's a mistake!" Atrocities against helpless prisoners are of course wicked; but ours--like other Bushie policies--are also stupid blunders.
-----------
THOUSANDS OF PAKISTANIS demonstrate, in various cities, over alleged desecration of Koran by U.S. guards in Cuba prison. REUTERS
-------------
Muslims in SIX countries demonstrated on 27 May against the U.S., over the Koran crisis. Boston.com

Who'd know they'd get so excited over a book? Even American fundamentalists wouldn't get so upset over defiling a copy of the Bible.
That just shows that we shouldn't be meddling at all in regions whose cultures we don't understand at all !

 
OUR NUKE PLANTS STILL CAN BE ATTACKED.
says a board of experts.
Govt. responds that such a catastrophe is 'unlikely'.
(WashPost,7 Apr).

We'd like more assurance than 'unlikely' !

 
'IRAQ' LAUNCHES 'OFFENSIVE' IN BAGHDAD:
40,000 of our native militia (probably undertrained and underarmed) will set up checkpoints and blockades to seal off Baghdad. They will be backed by 10,000 U.S. troops.
[ This is like a horse/rabbit stew. One horse (GIs) and one rabbit (native militia) ].

Four officials of the new regime were assassinated in Baghdad. REUTERS,26May
---------
This sealing off of Baghdad weakens further the pretence of an 'all/Iraq' government. Not only are the Kurds implementing defacto secession--it turns out they can't get to Baghdad except by GOING THROUGH TURKEY!

The officials of our new regime cannot rule Iraq hiding out in the 'Green Zone' in Baghdad. Sooner or later the Shiites will set up an autonomous 'ministate' in the South to match the Kurdish one in the North.

Then they can leave the middle region (Sunni/Arab)--including Baghdad--to the guerillas. Of course it will be a litttle embarrassing for the U.S. to set up a HALF-BILLION DOLLAR embassy in a no-man's land.
-------------
The training of Iraq police is incredibly bad.
THE ECONOMIST
--------
2 U.S. helicopters were downed by small-arms fire.
One made it back to base. Two crewmen died in the other.

 
'N.Korea regime might collapse!' says StateDept.honcho, drooling with hope. He says N.K. shouldn't concentrate so on 'minor issues' like perjorative U.S. remarks about them [e.g., Bush's unique (for HeadOfState) insults aimed directly at Kim.] If these remarks are a minor issue holding up negotiations, then why do Bushies keep making them? Clearly they WANT to sabotage negotiations.

Scowcroft (adviser to Daddy Bush) notes that N.K. has nothing to lose by postponing negotiations; in the meantime it strengthens its military position, including th production of nukes and nuclear material. Boston.com

(Recently, Japan honcho let slip the admission that it's now U.S. & Japan standing against N.Korea, SOUTH KOREA, and China. China and South Korea can presumably prevent N.K. economic collapse.)

 
KHARZAI PRETENCE OF INDEPENDENCE flattened by Bush arrogance at their meeting. Bush denied K's request that U.S. troops in Afgh. should be under his control. He also refused a timetable for returning Afghan detainees in Cuba. And he demanded that K. do more to cut poppy production in Afgh. INDEPENDENT,26May

B's demands about poppy reduction will be as empty as K's demands. The country is not ruled by K (called 'the mayor of Kabul') but by warlords/druglords.

 
INDONESIAN THREAT: U.S. closed all its missions in Indonesia, fearing a terrorist threat. REUTERS,25May

This is just a reminder that we have somehow enraged one thousand millions of Muslims all over the world (242 million people in Indonesia, practically all Muslims--with jungle islands perfect for terrorist bases).

Our Pentagon bombers & missiles are, as usual, useless here, because the guerillas would love to see the capitol city of Jakarta bombed and weakened.

An American news agency showed that a nuclear weapon could be easily smuggled from Jakarta to LosAngeles in a ship-container.

 
WHAT WE'D NEED TO SUCCEED IN IRAQ:
The esteemed Brit historian, Niall Ferguson, in NYTIMES, offers a useful comparison of our Iraq project with the successful Brit takeover of Iraq after WWI.

He points out that the Brits had the equivalent of ONE MILLION INVADING TROOPS; they had a license to be incredibly ruthless, without the world's Media watching.

What he doesn't mention is that they cleverly found an UNEMPLOYED KING in Damascus, an authentic Descendent of the Prophet, whom they could tutor and get 'elected' as King of Iraq. His royal family was accepted as legitimate for decades, while Britain got lots of oil.
(see THE DESERT QUEEN by J. Wallach).

So, says Ferguson, we'd need one million men, a license for unlimited ruthlessness, and decades of time available (not to mention a native leader acceptable to all factions!) to set up a stable Iraq.

He thinks the results of our bugging out will be awful. But
as things are, this renowned historian guesses, the odds against our success are about 174 to 1. So the only issue is WHEN we bug out --how many more GIs must be killed or rendered armless, legless, eyeless, faceless, or brain-damaged, before we admit failure.
-------------
Somebody has pointed out that, after the '2000-dead-GIs' mark in Vietnam, we went on to get 67,000 other GIs killed--when our rulers knew it was all for nothing !

 
25,000 HUGE SHIP CONTAINERS EACH DAY enter U.S. ports. Very few are inspected for terrorist material in U.S. But people have been reassured to hear that we have agreements with foreign ports that containers will be inspected at that end.

Of course, even if that were true, explosives or even nuclear bombs could be inserted between that port and our ports. But now it turns out that the containers are NOT inspected thoroughly at that end, either! NYTIMES

And yet, though most Americans now see through Bush on other issues, 55% of Americans trust him on the 'security' issue! How can this be?

--perhaps the mere fact that we haven't seen a repeat of the 9/11 attack means that people assume Bush must be doing SOMETHING right. It IS a mystery why no such attack has yet taken place--but there is NO REASON to think that precautions by Bush should get the credit. He has consistently refused to fund even the obviously necessary precautions (e.g., inspecting these ship containers / or forcing the owners of super-dangerous chemical plants to take proper precautions vs. terrorists / or funding on an emergency level the recruitment and training of medical personnel to handle a very possible avian flu pandemic, let alone a very likely germ-war attack on our homeland.)

--The other possibility is that Americans think that our super-Pentagon forces guarantee our security, absorbing as they do $1200 millions per day. But what can these expensive bombers and missiles do to ward off or counter individual terrorists?
--------
We may feel super-powerful, thinking of how we could H-bomb any nation off the map in a day. But they are undoubtedly coming up with '2d-strike deterrents':
"If you bomb us, our survivors can attack your super-vulnerable homeland in dozens of ways, to make you regret it!"

The damage that 19 men, armed only with box-cutters, did on 9/11--that damage should warn us of the havoc that could be inflicted on us. We should divert to Homeland Protection much of the money wasted on the Pentagon. Instead Bush is devoting for each year of Homeland Protection as much money as the Pentagon gets each MONTH.

 
BUSH WANTS GAS ALTERNATIVE--IN 15 YEARS!
He calls for research on hydrogen as fuel..admirable enough, though it would admittedly take 15 years to make the change. abc/news

Meanwhile, hybrid cars like PRIUS can TODAY cut gas-consumption and pollution enormously: with certain adjustments, they can get 180 miles per gallon! [see below].

But Bush never mentions this present-day alternative.
OOPS ! It turns out that Bush recommended tax-incentives for hybrid vehicles as early as '01!
(see COMMENT, below.)
The question is, how much emphasis is he putting on hybrids, vs. emphasis, say, on drilling oil in nature preserves or research for remote hydrogen/electric cars?
I didn't know this was Bush initiative, though I did know there are tax-incentives for hybrid cars. (Are these incentives high enough? It's skyrocketing gas prices that are now putting hybrid cars so much in demand.)

By '01, it was clear that foreign car-makers were introducing hybrid cars.

 
STATES "RUSHING" TO DEVELOP ALL-ELECTRIC HYDROGEN CARS (not practical for 15 years.) This is the Bush strategy; disarm calls for cutting use of gasolene, by developing hydrogen cars (not needing huge batteries) that won't come on line for over a decade.
USATODAY
Meanwhile, amateurs have learned how to modify RIGHT NOW presently-available HYBRID cars to get up to 180 miles per gallon.(see below). You can bet none of our corrupt governments is working in THIS line.

(However, our Sharonista 'neoconservatives' are applauding this development, to free us somewhat from the control of oil producers among Israel-hating Arab states.)
----------------
TECHNICAL LEAP! Hybrid cars use gasolene partly to run engine, partly to run a generator, whose current can partly run the car. Result is great economy in gas-use.

There have been electric cars, which run completely on current; but they had to be plugged in overnight, and that was too much trouble, too easy to forget.

Now some hybrid users have tinkered to produce the best of both worlds. The car runs on gas/electric as before--but they can PLUG IT IN overnight and use mainly current, not gas.They get 65Miles-per-Gallon to 180 MPG! NYTIMES

If they forget or neglect to plug in the car, they can run it just as an ordinary hybrid.
-----------
Even a luddite like myself can be enthused over such a leap. But while some of the long-term implications are great, some are not so good.

Great!: --Oil is predicted to leap, perhaps, from present $57+ a barrel to $105! So, with this innovation, car-users (who in America are often poor) will perhaps not be bankrupted.

--There'll be less road-pollution, since less gasolene will be used.

--Middle-East oil-sultans will be restricted somewhat in the control they have over the world--though, with surging demand in China and India...(But perhaps these countries will also start using technology-economies. Japan did that, impressively, after a previous oil-shortage.) -----------------
NOT SO GREAT!
--Americans will not be forced to move to small cars/ carpools/public transport. So accidents will continue at the same rate, injuring several millions every year.And the latex-pollution from many tons of tire-wear will continue.

--Use of electric current will jump up. And it turns out that our coal power plants emit much mercury--which, it turns out, increases markedly the incidence of awful AUTISM in children--besides other health damages. Power-plants could be adjusted to cut mercury emissions; but Bushies refuse to demand this.

--Electricity could be generated not just from coal or nuke-plants, but instead by wind-turbines (actually cheaper per kilowatt!), and also by wave-surges on our extensive coasts, and so on.

But with the Bushies in power, eager to help their oil-buddies, there will be little incentive for these reforms.

Anyway, this innovation (by amateur tinkerers, NOT by corporations or by government) will change the highway culture markedly.

 
GUERILLAS KNOW WHEN GOVT.OFFICIALS ARE VULNERABLE: 17 killed this month, including head of a counter-insurgency unit.
"They're trying to prove that Iraq is ungovernable," says a Brit official. "They've got very good penetration."
INDEPENDENT,25May

 
"U.S. IS WORST OFFENDER VS. HUMAN RIGHTS", says Amnesty International. REUTERS,25May

Surprise,surprise!

 
U.S. TO PULL BACK TO 4 GIANT, PERMANENT BASES IN IRAQ--the beginning perhaps of a bugout.
GUARDIAN

(Our native militia are clearly not ready to take over the fight vs. the guerillas. This move sounds like the 'Vietnamization' that preceded our bugout in Vietnam.)

It might be recognition that our troops do more harm than good in Iraq with their crude tactics.

But now the guerillas will have basically free rein in most of Iraq--unless the Kurds settle for defending their region in the North, and the Shiites settle for defending their ministate in the South. Then only the middle region (Sunni/Arab) will be left to the guerillas. This is the '3-ministate' outcome I've been predicting.

The guerillas could attack our fortresses with new poison gasses that no gasmask can counter. And it will shortly be too hot for GIs to wear protective 'spacesuits' regularly.

 
FIFTY-FOUR GIs KILLED SO FAR IN MAY. (How many maimed or wounded?)
"Perhaps 2 wars going on now: (a) guerillas vs. U.S. (b) sects vs. each other." MercuryNews

Still, most Iraq casualties are caused by Sunni guerillas.
A simpler way to view all this is to say that the guerillas seem able to attack when and where they wish.

Obviously the U.S. 'offensive' near the Syria border didn't weaken the guerillas, though it cost U.S. lives. The present U.S. offensives in Baghdad and Hadditha don't seem likely to change things either.
-------
REUTERS says SIXTY GI's killed in May.

 
WHO TRUSTS WHOM? A Japanese official said publicly that the U.S. doesn't trust SouthKorean govt, so won't share intelligence with them. He said that U.S. & Japan are lined up against N.Korea, So.KOrea, and China! Chosun.com,25May

Certainly So.Korea has no reason to trust the Bushies!
They hint that they're ready to bomb No.Korea--seemingly wanting to provoke N.K. to strike first (destroying Seoul! and slaughtering tens of thousands of GIs)--to give them an excuse to nuke N.K.

Or else the Bushies would 'premptively' bomb N.K., and then when Pyongyang survivors struck back (again, destroying Seoul!), U.S. would nuke them.

The 50-year alliance between U.S. & So.Korea is dead as a door-nail.

 
THOUSAND-MILE PIPELINE sponsored by U.S. (to bypass MiddleEast Sultans and Russia)--first section opened. The interesting question is: will it be sabotaged?
ChinaView

 
TRADE DEFICIT (EXCESS OF U.S. IMPORTS OVER OUR EXPORTS) WILL RISE TO $900 BILLION NEXT YEAR, say experts at OECD. [ FinTimes,24May ]

Nobody talks about how much of this preposterous gap is caused by gigantic imports by Pentagon.

 
SYRIA QUITS PRETENDING FRIENDSHIP WITH U.S.: They announced a cutoff of 'military cooperation' (U.S. said there wasn't much of that anyway.)
REUTERS
Why has Syria made this announcement? Perhaps to warn the world that U.S. is preparing to bomb them (in obedience to Bush's master Sharon.) Also, Syria may want to get rid of U.S. personnel who might be spying to facilitate the bombing (though such on-the-ground spying is what U.S. cannot do!)

If (a) Bushies are getting ready to bug out of Iraq, or (b) they just want to distract people from their Iraq failure, it would make sense for them to attack N.Korea, Iran, or Syria (with bombs--we hardly have any troops available!)

Now N.Korea already has nukes hidden under mountains, which it might donate to terrorists (to convey to our Homeland) if we bomb the hell out of them.

Iran is #4 in oil production, and could block other oil supplies coming through the Strait of Hormuz. And they could stir up Iraq Shiites to open up a 'second front' vs. U.S. forces. So they don't seem helpless enough to bomb safely.

Syria does seem helpless enough. U.S. has been heaping accusations against Syria (in regard to Lebanon, in regard to their border with Iraq)--such accusations are often preparatory to a first-strike attack.

What could Syria have as 2d-strike deterrent ("You can destroy Damascus--but we could make you regret it.") Well, they could openly help the Sunni/Arab guerillas kill GIs in Iraq. (They might have gas or germ weapons to use vs. GIs.)

They could openly take over Lebanon again.

Bushies thought Iraq was helpless enough to invade safely (Wolfowitz said it would be a 'cakewalk'.)
They may be also wrong about Syria.

 
KIRKUK OIL: The Northern region near Kirkuk has 40% of Iraq oil.Saddam expelled Kurds from the area, put in Arabs. Now the city is divided evenly between Kurds(35%) and Arabs(35%) and Turkomen(26%)--but the Kurds who survived Saddam's slaughter (coming back after expulsion, often living in tents near the city) won control of the province in the election.

The Kurds (with a veto) almost sank the election of the prime minister, demanding that they get control of Kirkuk right away. The conflict was postponed: Kurds also have a veto over the constitution now being written. (It's extremely unlikely that the new Shiite-dominated 'all/Iraq' regime will get control of Kirkuk oil!)
Kurds and Arabs are murdering each other in the region.USATODAY

Guerillas have shown they can sabotage oil pipelines around Kirkuk.It looks as if final outcome will be from a deal between the Kurds and the Sunni/Arab guerillas, with the 'all/Iraq' regime revealed as the fiction it is.

To get to Baghdad, Kurds must go through Turkey! The local roads are unsafe.

(Shiites will have to settle for their own ministate in the South, with plenty of oil, with the only Iraq seaport in Basra, and with friendly Shiite Iran next door.)
-------------
FIFTY KILLED ON MONDAY (far more wounded!)
Targets were GIs, our native militia AND SHIITE CIVILIANS. (Some Sunni clerics have been killed recently, seemingly by Shiites--but these killers may have been guerillas masquerading as Shiites..they obviously want to stir up a civil war--presumably to keep ordinary Sunnis from turning against them.)

The good news is that there hasn't been a Sunni/Shiite war in Mesopotamia for 200 years.
RadioFreeEurope

 
SEX-ABUSE CLAIMS WON'T BE FOLLOWED UP:
The 'Legionaires of Christ' is a conservative, well-heeled Catholic 'order'. Its founder was accused, years ago, by half-a-dozen former seminarians, of forcing sex on them.
(Seminarians are at the mercy of their superiors; they can be expelled at any time, without any reasons.)

Card.Ratzinger (now Benedict XVI) was in charge of such investigations. He did nothing for 7 years, until the day JPII died (JPII was a personal friend of this guy). Then he started an inquiry, with the complainers bound to silence.

Now this agency has announced that NO INVESTIGATION will be launched into this matter.
Boston.COM

People like myself who have come to believe that the Roman hierarchy are harmful to human welfare--such people should rejoice that this agency is discrediting itself so shamelessly.

 
700 killed since new govt. was announced. U.S. offensive on Wed. in Western (Sunni/Arab) Iraq. 18 GIs killed in 4 days.
Bloomberg
----------------
U.S.,NATIVE MILITIA attack guerillas in Baghdad.
Meanwhile, dozens of Iraqis and a few GIs killed all over Iraq, plus far more wounded. Boston.com

Head of counter-insurgency agency was gunned down.
MiddleEastOnline

 
One of Lyons' Iraq-rants was just printed in USATODAY (circ: 2 million).

Bugout is now thinkable, may soon be real.

 
CHEMICAL DISASTERS: In 1984, a U.S. chemical plant in India accidentally leaked some gases, over half a million people were killed or injured; many are still disabled.

There are now more than 15,000 potentially deadly chemical plants and refineries in America. More than 100 of them could each put one million people at risk. One plant could put the entire population of New Orleans at risk.

Besides that, there are now individual terrorists who'd love to kill lots of Americans. And it turns out they could easily manage this. The security arrangements at these plants are absurdly lax; and the Bushie government will not force these plants to tighten up these arrangements. NYTIMES

This just reinforces the evidence that the Bushies strangely enough don't seem to give a damn about protecting our Homeland from individual terrorists.

 
Seven Thousand INDONESIANS demonstrate vs. U.S. over the desecration of Holy Quran in our Cuba prisons.

There are 242 million Indonesians, mostly Muslims. They don't share race or language with Arabs--only devotion to Islam and rage over U.S. slob-tactics vs. prisoners.

If only 1 in 1000 Indonesians turn terrorist, that's 242,000 new terrorists, willing or eager to die killing Americans.

You can bet almost no Americans speak any of the Indonesian dialects, so we can't spy on them. (The jungle-islands of Indonesia would be perfect locations for AlQaeda training camps.)

 
THAT OTHER WAR: People have forgotten that goofy Bushies started a war in Iraq when they were already at war with Taliban in Afghanistan! Americans think we have won that war.

On the contrary: While there are far fewer GIs in Afghanistan, a higher rate of GIs have died there since March than in Iraq! And this 3 years after we 'conquered' the Taliban.

AssocPress, cited in COLORADOAN,22mAHY
---------
Good News: A prominent Shiite group has negotiated with a Sunni group, to lessen chance of civil war.

Bad News: the Shiite group is that headed by SADR, who will cooperate with Sunnis to oust U.S. from Iraq!
ABC/NEWS22May (Sadr is the guy who told Iraqis to paint U.S. & Israel flags on ground in front of mosques, so worshippers could wipe their feet on these flags.)
-------------
A dozen senior officials of our new Iraq regime have been assassinated in recent months, including one today. REUTERS

 
'MURDERS NOT INSPIRED BY PHOTOS' says dumb Bush, about the humiliating photo of Saddam in underwear.
"They are inspired by an ideology so primitive that many Westerners can't understand it." YAHOO/NEWS,21May

Bush doesn't understand how Muslims think and feel--so he shouldn't be meddling with them. (U.S. fundamentalists like Bush are pretty primitive themselves. But one primitive religion has no understanding of a different one.)
--------
Muslims in LONDON call for bombing NewYork!
[ThisIsLondon,21May]

 
THOUSANDS OF SHIITES DEMONSTRATE VS. U.S.
They walked on paintings of U.S, Israel flags, as requested by SADR (the firebrand rival of placid Sistani for leadership of the Shiites). [Assoc.Press, cited by BillingsGazette]

 
THREE HUNDRED U.S. CONTRACTORS KILLED in Iraq so far. Result? No foreigners want to help rebuild Iraq. Boston.com

It's obvious that the guerillas don't want U.S. to succeed in rebuilding Iraq--and that they can prevent this!

The only hope would be to give up on middle Iraq (the Sunni/Arab region) and try to protect and develop Shiite ministate in South, and Kurdish ministate in North.

But this would, of course, involve an admission of defeat for the Bushies.

 
MUSLIMS DISLIKE AMERICA: Many say now (for the first time) that they wouldn't want to visit America; many say they wouldn't mind if American withdrew completely from Muslim nations. GUARDIAN

If 'many' feel this way, you can bet that 'a few' have an even-stronger dislike for us, even willing to enlist as terrorists; and 'a few' of world's 1200 million Muslims
could mean tens of thousands of potential terrorists!

Countering these individual terrorists, the Pentagon's bombs, missiles, and now space stations(!) are pretty useless.

 
GREENSPAN ADMITS HOUSING BUBBLE: He denies that the bubble was 'national'--but said there are 'local' bubbles. LATimes

Trouble is, acknowledging a bubble often leads to panic-selling.

Many Americans think they're secure and well-to-do because of the fantastic value of their houses. When this bubble bursts, the full extent of the deprivation of ordinary Americans will be revealed.

 
SUNNI MOSQUES CLOSED 3 DAYS, IN PROTEST: over alleged murders of Sunnis by Sadrite Shiites; closed by Assn.ofSunniScholars.

"Pol.solutions are over and military solutions will follow.We will die rather than accept desecration of our Holy Book and detainment of our women!" said the top honcho of this group. BOSTON.COM,20May
-----------------
Sadrites share Sunni hatred of Americans. Both groups raising hell about alleged Yank desecration of sacred Quran. (Demonstrations also by Indian and Indonesian Muslims).
NEWSWEEK apologies, of course, did no good.

 
"ECO-ACTIVISTS ARE WORST TERRORIST THREAT !" says FBI. [ INDEPENDENT, 20May]
Absurd; eco-activists have never inflicted a huge harm (like McVeigh & 9/11).

In any case, we must remember that this threat is ADDED to the Muslim-terrorist threat, not substituted.

That makes it all the more poignant that Bushies are budgeting only $34 billion this YEAR for HomelandDefense Dept (about the match for ONE MONTH'S money for Pentagon).

They get away with this because Americans are dumb enough to think that Pentagon bombers and missiles (and now, SPACE STATIONS) can protect us from INDIVIDUAL terrorists.

Only local firemen, policemen, inspectors of ShipContainers, and especially Medical Personnel can ward off or repair after terrorist attacks. And these 'first responders' have had their budgets CUT by reckless Bushies.

 
U.S. PUSH FOR MIDDLE-EAST DEMOCRACY actually helps anti U.S. Islamists, says an article in FINANCIAL TIMES, 20May (which can be read only by subscribers). What a surprise!

 
GAS PRICES WON'T DISCOURAGE U.S. DRIVERS this summer, predicts FinTimes,20May.

Of course not; addicts are not deterred when heroin prices rise,either. And U.S. drivers can just spend less elsewhere; they haven't even had to sell their virgin daughters yet.

 
U.S. SANCTIONS WOULD HELP SYRIAN GOVT! says an analyst in Financial Times(20May--full article can be read only by subscribers.)

Typical Bush bungling. It looks as if, to obey Sharon--as is their custom, they'll have to bomb hell out of Syria.

This will annoy Russians, who have been siphoning aid AND WEAPONS to Syria. It will also remove any limits on Syrians coming into Iraq to join up with guerillas.

 
THE BAD NEWS: Global warming could make Northern Europe less habitable, on the one hand, and Mediterranean Europe less habitable on the other hand--causing a surge of refugees moving into middle Europe.
REUTERS

THE GOOD NEWS: Devices to harness tide-flows to generate electricity have been tested in Europe, and will soon be installed on a commercial scale in Portugal.
(Thus less global-warming carbon dioxide will be generated WITHOUT resorting to more nuke plants!) REUTERS

Will U.S. follow suit? Not if the Bushies can help it!

 
PENTAGON DENIAL COUNTERED: In response to the NEWSWEEK allegation of severe defilement of copies of the HolyQuran in our Cuba prisons (intended--crazily-- to humilitate and 'soften' Muslim prisoners for interrogation) the Pentagon says they never got 'credible' allegations of such defilement (and of course their official written policy forbade it!)

Then the International RedCross said that it had warned Pentagon in '02 and in '03 of repeated prisoners' allegations of such defilement. One ingenious military response was to say that the Muslim prisoners defiled the sacred book themselves, to frame the guards! CanBroadcastCo.

 
GEORGE GALLOWAY TELLS OFF BUSHIES: This Brit MemberOfParliament opposed the invasion from the start. So a Brit paper said he'd got a bribe from Saddam. Galloway sued the paper and won.

Then this slander was repeated by a U.S. Senator. They were foolish enough to subpoena him and let him speak to the Committee on nation-wide TV. Boy, did he tell them:

"I met Saddam exactly as often as did Donald Rumsfeld--only Rumsfeld met him to sell him guns and maps to use those guns.

"I told the world that, contrary to your claims, Iraq had no WMDs, nor any connection with AlQaeda, nor any connection to 9/11.

"I told the world that, countrary to your claims, the Iraqi people would not welcome the invasion; that the fall of Baghdad would not be the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning.

"What I said turned out to be right; you turned out to be wrong. One Hundred Thousand have paid with their lives, including 1600 GIs sent to their deaths by your pack of lies. Over fifteen thousand GIs have been wounded, many disabled for life--all for a pack of lies." [TRUTHOUT]

 
AVIAN FLU GETTING READY TO MOVE HUMAN-TO-HUMAN. WorldHealthOrgn. warns of probable world pandemic, killing over seven million people.
[Earthtimes.org/19May]
This emphasizes the negligence of the Bushies.

We already face a severe shortage of nurses, and even of nursing teachers. (A Colorado hospital was paying$20,000 to lure a nurse from another hospital!)

The Bushies have shown no real concern over this shortage, even in the face of this probable pandemic.

We also face a likely germ-war attack from terrorists.
But still the Bushies don't seem to care.

 
SADR (the firebrand rival vs. peaceful Sistani for Iraq Shiite loyalties) suggested that the U.S. & Israeli flags be painted on the ground outside mosques, so Iraqis could STEP ON THEM!

Analysts also noted the reconciliation of Iran & the new (Shiite) Iraq regime (the Iraqi govt. admitted that Iraq--i.e., Saddam--had started the awful war with Iran a couple of decades ago, infuriating some Sunnis even more!)--this reconciliation means that if we attack Iran, this would provoke a nasty reaction from Iraqi Shiites, who so far have NOT joined the Sunnis in much guerilla activity.
U.S. generals said the outlook for U.S. is bleak in BOTH Iraq AND AFGHANISTAN!
ChristSciMonitor
----------------
BLEAK VIEW from U.S. generals, who felt more free to express reservations, after Rice's emergency visit: NYTIMES
Telling: after all the chatter about (and billions spent) training our native militia--in our recent offensive near Syrian border,NO IRAQIS WERE INVOLVED !--even though a shortage of troops let some guerillas slip back across the border. (Usually some native militia are included just for pretence.) Everyone admits that the effort to replace our troops with native militia has been disappointing.

Generals are predicting ultimate success, of course (though one said our effort 'could fail'--amazing admission!) but this success might come only after many years of our involvement (Lyons: and thousands more of GI casualties). [Generals' optimism after the elections is now admitted to have been 'euphoria'.]
(Generally, when a general admits his side COULD fail, this means they DID fail long ago!)

Last year there were 25 car-bombings in Baghdad. This year, one hundred and twenty-six in 80 days.

Our new puppet interior minister said we would not attack mosques any longer; U.S. said 'Oh, yeah?"

Iraq confidence in our new puppet-regime has sunk from 85% (after the election) to 45% now. (To support guerillas, people must believe that the new regime won't last.) Electricity supplies are worse than last year in many regions. Oil exports are lower than last year.

But if we bugged out now,say the generals, 'Iraq would sink into civil war and chaos'--i.e., it would sink even faster than it is sinking now?

 
HOW DOES DIVINE GUIDANCE WORK? George Bush Sr. passed up the chance to topple Saddam, they say, because he feared the artificial nation of Iraq, without a dictator, would break up in bloody chaos between Kurds, Sunni/Arabs and Shiites. Presumably he advised his son to abstain also.

But Bush Jr. supposedly said that he heeded his Heavenly Father, NOT his mere earthly one. He toppled Saddam, and sure enough...it turned out that Dad was right.
-----------
This raises the question of how Divine Guidance works. When people pray for a better job, or a healing of sickness, and nothing happens, they say, "Well, God sometimes says NO."

But when they pray earnestly for guidance, then automatically and confidently they take the next thought occurring to them as inspired by God. They never think that maybe this time also, God said, "NO!--figure it out for yourself."

binLaden prays and says Allah told him it's OK to murder innocent people. Zarqawi just said, "God ordered us to kill..." Zionists pray and announce that Yahweh just confirmed his ancient gift to them of the Holy Land; then they kill the present inhabitants who resist their land-grab.

Fundamentalist Protestants pray and then announce various weird interpretations of the Scripture--for instance that God forbids blood transfusions. Mormon elders pray and then announce that their previous guidance has been revoked: blacks CAN be priests!The Popes pray and then announce that contraception is forbidden.

These believers need to realize that, when asked for Guidance--as when asked for observable favors--God sometimes says NO!

 
NOW IT MAKES SENSE! It's been puzzling why the Bushies have been disrupting negotiations over N.Korea's alleged nuke-production. But a new book floats a balloon that makes horrible sense.

The NYTIMES review of the book is headlined:"What to Do about a Country That Has a Nuclear Threat and No Use for Rules?" (At first, I thought the book was about Bush's America..but no, it's about N.Korea.)

The scenario suggested is this: 1) we launch conventional bombs at their supposed nuke facilities (the real ones are probably deep underneath mountains.) (2)They retaliate in their puny way; whereupon (3) we nuke them off the map.

Thus, in demonstrating our nukes on an unpopular country, we show the rest of the disobedient countries how crazy we are (that's called, "Playing the Crazy Card"), intimidating them into obeying our commands.

Now let's look at the second step of that scenario: their 'puny' retaliation. In a few hours they can fire an arsenal of artillery and missiles that will remove Seoul from the map, and slaughter tens of thousands of GIs in South Korea and perhaps in Guadacanal.

(If we are shameless enough not to wait a while for them to start retaliating, after our first attack, then why bother? Why not just launch the nukes in a pre-emptive first strike?)

Fifty years ago, we bombed every N.Korean city off the map, with non-nuke weapons. Their survivors came out of caves to rebuild the country, more or less, and build a formidable military machine. This time their survivors will have a half-dozen nukes buried under mountains (which even our nukes can't destroy.)

I would imagine they have already made arrangements, if nuked, to pass over these nukes to terrorists who will launch them at our Homeland (needing no ICBMs; nukes can be smuggled into some of the thousands of gigantic ShipContainers entering our ports --UNINSPECTED--each day. Or they can be fired from cruise missiles on freight ships in mid-Pacific.) This would NOT be the time to be living near our West Coast ports!

I'd guess that China would help the retaliating terrorists covertly; China has a REAL second-strike nuclear deterrent..if we nuked them, they could make us regret it! (Also, by selling all their U.S. bonds,they could wreck our economy instantly.)

You can bet that N.K. has also developed germ-weapons to contribute to terrorists, to deliver to us.

When our nuke attack on N.K. is followed by the devastation of our Homeland, other countries might develop 2d-strike deterrents, instead of obeying us. Russia, China, Britain, France, Israel, Pakistan, India already have them. Iran doesn't have to produce nukes, inviting bombs on their facilities; rich Iran can simply BUY nukes from one of the present nuke-holders!

(Other nations probably have germ-war arsenals to retaliate with ..against our pathetically vulnerable Homeland.)

An exciting time lies ahead.

 
ZARQUAWI SPEAKS: Defends killing of Shiite 'infidels', even of women and children. (It's not clear if he expressed regret for this necessary 'collateral damage', as U.S. does.)

In the whole year of '04, there were 25 car-bombings in Baghdad. This May so far, already there have been TWENTY-ONE such attacks in Baghdad! Boston.com
----------------
GUERILLA INSTRUCTIONS ON-LINE! Recruits are told fairly obvious things, e.g., "Don't shoot GIs standing around a tank; shoot the tankers!"/Also:"Shoot commanders, not ordinary GIs."
U.S. officers fear that these on-line instructions might also recruit new young Iraqis (by making the guerilla project more glamorous. ABCnews

Thinking this way, they may realize that MAIMING enemies interferes with enemy operations more than KILLING them does. [That's an axiom of modern war.]

That shows the folly of U.S. journalists practically ignoring the number of GIs maimed or wounded, telling only of the dead.
---------------------
When will it be obvious that U.S. & its new regime have to pull back and settle for defending Shialand in South, and Kurdland in North..leaving Baghdad and middle Sunni/Muslim area to the guerillas ? !

 
SOUTH KOREA has been buying dollar-assets to slow the rise of its own currency (which would harm its exports).
But now their banker says they WON'T be intervening any more in currency-markets. (Earlier they caused a short-lived panic by saying they would 'diversify' their currency-holdings, e.g., sell some U.S. bonds.) FinTimes

With the two gigantic, seemingly-permanent U.S. deficits (federal and trade), one would expect dollar-bonds to sink in value. But so far Asian banks have bought them up to hold down the value of their own currencies.

If they start selling their bonds (or just quit buying them), the U.S. will be in big trouble. We have to go on borrowing, so we'll have to offer higher interest rates, which will depress U.S. economy.

If they start selling off our bonds, they'll lose a lot as the value of the bonds sinks; but the nation that sells first will lose less..a prescription for a panic.

The FEDERAL DEFICIT: It matches pretty closely the $440,000 millions we shovel to the Pentagon each year.
The rest of the fed.govt. is living within its means; we should refer to 'The Pentagon Deficit'.

The TRADE DEFICIT: (excess of our imports over our exports): Surely the biggest importer is, again, the Pentagon. First, it uses gigantic amounts of oil, practically all imported. Secondly, it maintains dozens of (fairly useless) BASES overseas..all the expenses of those bases count as IMPORTS, so the Pentagon is likely the main force behind our TRADE deficits.

Congress is threatening large tariffs against Chinese imports. That might provoke China to start selling their huge amounts of U.S. bonds.

The biggest threat to the U.S. is our own Pentagon.

 
"HOMELAND PROTECTION FUNDAMENTALLY FLAWED" says largest organization of U.S. police chiefs.
The billions spent have not significantly improved our ability to ward off, or recover from, terrorist attacks.

Bushies have CUT AID to local police departments significantly ! Bushie spokesmen said they have given billions in such aid. USATODAY

But MANY, MANY billions are needed. Local police & firemen and medical staff are 'first responders' when the next terrorist attack happens.

Bushies can't afford to fund expensive precautions to protect our Homeland: not while doling out luscious tax-breaks for the wealthy, and shovelling $1200 millions each day to the Pentagon (useless vs. individual terrorists).

 
WHO'S DUMBEST? A person the other night questioned my assumption that the Bushies are the dumbest Presidential team in living memory."What about the Lyndon Johnson team? They got us into the Viet fiasco; it lasted 10 years, with millions of Viet casualties and 250,000 U.S. casualties. And all for nothing."

I thought about that, then said, "The point is that these Bushies LEARNED NOTHING from Vietnam, not about how we couldn't occupy a country whose language and culture we didn't understand.

"Not only that, they learned nothing from the Yugoslavia trauma. Tito held together those resentful ethnic groups for decades, by sheer terror. When he disappeared, and the Western nations approved of one of the sub-nations going independent...then bloody chaos prevailed, which lasts even till now. If we pulled out, the Kosovo Albanians would slaughter or drive out the few remaining Kosovo Serbs.

"Daddy Bush warned them NOT to topple Saddam, because that would unleash ethnic/religious hatreds in an artificial nation, drawn on maps by Britain after WWI. But Bush heeded his Heavenly Father, not his mere earthly one.

They should also have learned from the Palestinian intifada, from the attack on the Cole, and from 9/11, that a surprising number of Muslims are willing to perish themselves in killing Americans. So the occupation would be even more dangerous than the attempted occupation of Vietnam. (Suicide bombing is devastatingly effective: the bomber doesn't have to plan a getaway, and the bomber isn't around to torture for info about his backers.)

"Bushies were so sure the Iraqis would welcome us that they made no Plan B in case that didn't work out. And Bush, faced with gross incompetence by his whole team, reappointed them or rewarded them with medals--except for Powell,the only normal mind in the bunch.

"Also worth mentioning is the way the Bushies are wrecking our economy.No administration in my memory managed to make all the peoples of the world despise us, and ALSO to wreck our economy.

No, they ARE, besides being crooked, deceiving, and bloody ruthless, the DUMBEST administrative team in recent history! As such they represent well the dumbed-down American people.

(True, Rice has a PhD..but then Bush himself,I understand, has a MBA from Harvard! Shows you what U.S. degrees are worth nowadays.)

 
letter to USATODAY:

Two Congressmen (on 17May) said we should pull our troops out of Iraq at once. Then your editorial writers thought they had to present 'the other side'. They say the polls show Americans are now reluctant to 'cut and run' (from fear of humiliation: we have no national interest at stake in Iraq.)

Your editorial approves of this admittedly 'fragile' consensus. You say there is no viable alternative. If we 'bugged out', Iraq could be used as a staging ground for terrorists training to attack America. But first of all, there are already many such staging grounds all over the world, e.g., in the jungle-islands of Indonesia. Secondly, observers agree that the terrorists are using the crude tactics of U.S. troops right now to recruit AND TRAIN IN COMBAT terrorists who can later attack our homeland.

The only hope you offer is that we can turn the guerilla factions against each other. Meanwhile the guerillas are efficiently triggering a civil war between Shiites and Sunnis, which will leave GIs caught in the middle.
(Two Shiite clerics and one Sunni cleric were killed just today, Tuesday. )
Boston.com )

[Prominent Sunni clerics accused the new Shiite regime of 'State Terrorism'--assassinating Sunni clerics. INDEPENDENT
One wouldn't blame Shiites if they did start striking back at Sunni sympathizers with the guerillas; but still, that might start a civil war!]

You admit that our 'staying the course' does not guarantee success. The question is whether our staying on even offers a good PROBABILITY of success!
This is NOT a race where we might undermine the guerillas before the ever-increasing U.S. opposition to 'staying the course' gets too large to ignore.This is a race we're certain to lose.

We'll have to bug out eventually, leaving an anti-American Iraq, with an oil-soaked Shiite 'ministate' allied with America-hating Iran. (An Iranian official visited Iraq today, reminding them that Yanks will leave, but that Iran will always be their neighbor.) Together the Shiites in Iran and Iraq will produce perhaps more oil even than SaudiArabia.

Thousands more of GI casualties will be the price for this pointless delay.

 
Vincent Carroll [rMtnNews,17May) notes that it wasn't Newsweek's story about Koran desecration that killed all those; riot-victims; it was Muslim rioters. Of course.

However, he omits several factors: 1) U.S. prison guards have used various 'psychological tortures' on Muslim prisoners; (2) desecrating the Koran is one such measure that is bound to occur to slob Western prison guards, who are given to think that practically any cruelty can be used on prisoners; (3) released prisoners have said that such desecrations did occur (4) We have made ourselves so hated by many of the 1200 millions of world Muslims that they'd believe any such story without hesitation.

More important: (5) Americans don't understand Muslim culture at all--for instance their intense reverence for the Holy Koran--so we should never have tried to occupy a Muslim country. (6) Even now, GIs probably do more harm than good in Iraq , recruiting more terrorists than they kill. For the sake of Iraqis, and for their own sake, we should bring them home promptly.

 
AFGHAN CLERICS THREATEN HOLY WAR VS. AMERICA if we don't hand over to them the U.S. guards in Cuba who allegedly desecrated the Holy Quran.
TheHindu
Americans just can't imagine how these strange people think. Back when the Shah of Iran was toppled (in the most democratic revolution of our time--one in four Iranians were in the streets, so the soldiers wouldn't fire on their relatives)..we all assumed that it was the cruelty of his regime that triggered the revolt.

But a friend who spoke Farsi was there just before the revolt; he said the arrogant, Westernized Shah dared to have his photo taken water-skiing, half naked. This offended Iranians perhaps as much or more than the cruelty.

These clerics want the U.S. guards to be BEHEADED, not just to face U.S. trial. But U.S. can't let even its guilty troops be handed over to such a fate. So we have an impasse, which might make Afghanistan a real hotspot for our few troops there.

MORAL: we shouldn't meddle with people of an alien culture which provincial Americans can never understand.

 
BRIT HONCHOS WARN TRIGGER-HAPPY GIs:
The Brits have long experience at countering guerillas (in Malaya and Ulster). Too much risking of civilian lives recruits new terrorists. But when Brit consultants tried to explain to Americans that their trigger-happy actions will prolong the Iraq conflict by a decade or so, the Yanks just laughed at them. LondonTELEGRAPH

In Vietnam, we were told that U.S. forces were trying to win the 'hearts and minds' of the natives. In fact, the real slogan was "Grab 'em by the balls; their hearts and minds will follow!" We grabbed, but they didn't follow; they threw us out on our ass.
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U.S. intelligence honcho: "Insurgency has grown IN SIZE and complexity over the last year." (70 attacks now each day/400 killed in 2 weeks).

A former U.S. honcho in our Iraq regime: "They're getting stronger with each passing day. There's no evidence whatsoever that they can't win."

Our units are undermanned. One marine unit put up cardboard cutouts to pretend there were more GIs there.
ChicagoTribune
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The battle near the Syrian border showed the guerillas to be brave and clever (e.g., hiding in crawl-space to fire up at GIs entering a house). It took 1000 GIs plus a tank and helicopter to put down the guerillas in this little desert town.

Nine GIs were killed. We don't know how many guerillas killed for each GI killed it would take to make them give up.
LondonTIMES
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Patrick Cockburn writes about the 'Northern Front' between the Kurds and the Sunni/Arabs (harboring the guerillas). The area is in chaos; Kurds wanting to go to Baghdad must GO THRU TURKEY! (The local roads are too dangerous.) The pipelines are under constant attack.

The huge city of Mosul is basically unprotected now by U.S. troops: only 6000 troops in a city of millions.
COUNTERPUNCH

This battle will be settled by a deal between Kurds and Sunni/Arab guerillas. The new Shiite 'prime minister' with pretensions of controlling All/Iraq will have little influence here.

 
ONLY FORTY-SIX % APPROVE OF BUSH'S PERFORMANCE; 51% DISAPPROVE.
MyWestTexas

But who cares? All 3 leaders of this war-fiasco got re-elected (in Britain, Australia and here). Senate is now 55 GOP (plus Cheney) vs. 45 Dems.

 
SADR SHOWS UP AGAIN: The firebrand Shiite cleric (a rival in leadership with nonviolent Sistani) just came out again in public to demand once again that the U.S. 'occupiers' get out of Iraq immediately. GUARDIAN

CHALABI is the exile jerk who helped Bushies justify their invasion; later the Bushies 'turned against him' (or pretended to).

But now he turns out to have an important role in the new regime..and apparently he's lined up with SADR!
Strange.

 
SELLING U.S. ASSETS: Central banks sold more U.S. assets than they bought last month (first time since Sept.02). Asian banks continued to buy our bonds--but that's because they want to keep their currency devalued (to improve their exports).

The sellers were showing that they think our trade deficit will not soon improve. FinTimes
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One suspects that PENTAGON overseas purchases (oil of course!) and financing our dozens of fairly useless overseas bases--that these 'imports' are one main source of our trade deficit..but no journalists ever mention this possibility!

 
SIXTY-NINE IRAQI CASUALTIES ON MONDAY.
The committee of SunniScholars (those approved by Saddam earlier) denounced the killings as 'state terrorism',
presumably by the militia of the new Shiite/Kurd regime.
REUTERS

 
U.S. LOSING? Patrick Cockburn, a respected Brit journalist long in Iraq, claims that U.S. correspondents don't cover the war; they cower behind the ramparts of the Green Zone.

He points out that while we were levelling Fallujah, Mosul fell temporarily to the guerillas--a town 5 times as big as Fallujah. Though our troops came back and 'retook' Mosul, they soon left.

He reminds us that the crude U.S. tactics are recruiting new guerillas.

We still can't defend the short, vital road from Baghdad to the airport!

Cockburn compares U.S. conceit with the conceit of the Czarist army that self-confidently attacked 'primitive' Japan in the beginning of 20th century and got whomped. INDEPENDENT

 
KHARZAI WILL 'VETO U.S. OPERATIONS' !
Our puppet president (once a functionary of a U.S. oil company) has been complaining mildly about the crude tactics of U.S. troops in Afghanistan. (He still must travel in U.S. helicopters, not safe on the roads. I believe he still needs U.S. bodyguards; Afghans can't be trusted near him.)

Now he says he will 'veto' U.S. operations. He & whose army? INDEPENDENT,15may

 
NOT only are ENLISTMENTS running short, several thousand actual servicemen have deserted. INDEPENDENT,15May.

CAN THEY BE SO DUMB? Everyone knows that the army feels free to keep you in even after your enlistment term has ended. Now they're offering 'only 15 months' of active service, with of course the rest of 8 years on call!

 
DA VINCI BULLSHIT: This book THE DaVINCI CODE has sold millions of copies--partly because of its nasty attack on the unpopular Roman Church.The head of a real Catholic organization (OPUS DEI) is accused in this book of half-aware complicity in murder; at the beginning there is no customary disavowal that the characters in the book are completely fictional.The real addresses of OPUS DEI are given, in case someone wants to bomb them.Talk about venom!

The book is a good thriller, with a plot-surprise about every 3 pages.

I have little use myself for the present Roman Hierarchy--but I must protest the ridiculous attack launched by this book. The main theme is that early Christianity was headed by MaryMagdalene, not Peter. It was Constantine, Brown says, who suppressed this feminist Christianity and replaced it with a fraudulent male-chauvinist organization. I'm not a historian; maybe so AND MAYBE NOT. People who take their history from a novelist are people who want to believe such claims.

My view is that present-day Christianity is of course anti-female, like every world culture till now--but that it is the LEAST anti-female traditional culture in the world. Only now have the male rulers of the world decided that ordinary women are more useful economically than are ordinary men. And of course the ordinary men (of all religions), deprived of age-old automatic superiority, have launched a vitriolic backlash.
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First, let's compare 'religions of the Book' (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) with Hindu or Chinese Culture. Before the Talmud, it was understood everywhere that women had better not stray--under the penalty of death--but the sex-life of men was their own business. The Talmud made a startling change, claiming (a) that the Deity cared about our sex-life, and (b) that adultery was forbidden by Him to women AND ALSO TO MEN! And Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have all kept to this position, at least in theory.

Judaism and Islam have put in escape-clauses in allowing divorce (in Islam, to women also THEORETICALLY.) Islam installed an even-better escape clause..a man could have more than one wife..what's more (at least in some versions) he can 'marry' a whore for a few hours, pay her for sex, then 'divorce her!

A friend (see COMMENTS below) notes correctly that polygamy is forbidden in neither Testament. But the Catholic Church is not restricted by what's in the Bible. (Nothing in the New Testament forbids abortion or suicide.) The Roman Church has always forbidden polygamy, even bigamy, even serial polygamy (remarriage after divorce). So wives are protected better by the Roman Church than by Judaism or Islam.

Jesus forbade remarriage after divorce; he dared to
contradict Moses explicitly on this issue..and when his followers said, "Well, then, it's a mistake to get married!" he responded that it IS better to avoid marriage (and, of course, sex)! And that wife-protecting part of Jesus' sayings is preserved in the present (allegedly anti-female) Christian version of the Gospel!

The Catholic version of Jesus stopped the stoning of women for adultery. But recently, in Nigeria, under one interpretation of Muslim Sharia, a woman--never mind her claim that she was raped--narrowly escaped being buried up to her neck in sand, then stoned to death.
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It's interesting to compare the myth of Jesus' virgin birth with the earlier Greek myth about Athena. She was the hero of Athens (named for her!) But she was not born of woman. She came from Zeus' head, escaping any pollution or inferiority from a human mother.

Jesus on the other hand was produced WITHOUT A HUMAN FATHER, escaping the pollution in semen--and Original Sin is passed on through the father's semen. While Eve tempted Adam to sin, it was Adam's sin that doomed us all, not Eve's.
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No doubt the 18th-century Christians (Protestant and Catholic, on both sides of the Atlantic) agreed mainly on one thing: killing witches--who were mainly female. I don't know if Muslims killed witches--perhaps not in such a wholesale way! The Old Testament says, "Thou shalt not allow a witch to live." (I have no way of knowing if Brown's claim is true of FIVE MILLION witches killed by Catholics; of course he doesn't mention those killed by Protestants.) Undoubtedly a shameful chapter in Church History.
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What about our modern world?
The Catholic Church has done more than any other agency to educate Third-World women! (And Protestant Christians are probably second in this matter.) I met a woman scientist from India, and asked her where she got that Irish brogue! From Irish nuns who taught her English, of course.

Catholics do not force clitoridectomy on their girls, as African pagans do. In Catholic countries, there is no severe shortage of women (a shortage caused by selective abortion of female foeti) as there is in 'pagan' India and China. And India--with mothers-in-law murdering daughters-in-law (who can't produce a son) frequently enough to be noticed by the government-- Hindus have all kinds of sexy female goddesses!

First-world countries (post-Christian) allow divorce of course--to men AND TO WOMEN. And this is not just in theory; first-world women dump their husbands regularly. They know they can earn at least a subsistence-living on their own.

The Catholic Church has been slow in many respects to respect the equality of women; but this lag it shares with almost every traditional institution worldwide.
The problem is not with this Church; the problem is with resentful men at large--and with many women who seem to support their own inferior position!