White House sources have told media outlets that President Bush will name White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales to replace John Ashcroft as US Attorney General.
Although Gonzales is being billed as a moderate, he is best-known as the author of the controversial memo advising the Administration that they need not abide by the Geneva Conventions when it comes to prisoners captured in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere in the “War on Terror.”
Compared to Ashcroft, maybe that is moderate.
One can only hope that future historians will look to Ron Suskind’s account of Bushite scorn for “reality-based communities” as an explanation for events of the early aughts. But it would be a mistake to attribute this kind of thinking to Bushites only. It is ingrained in all imperialists.
Earlier this year, mentor to the previous crop of “liberal” Imperialists and ICG founder Morton Abramowitz made an exasperated comment to a Serbian interviewer:
“My answer is that there is no entirely rational answer… you seek perfect reasoning, which does not correspond to reality on the ground.”
In other words, don’t bother with logic; there isn’t any.
Abramowitz’s acolytes (the Holbrookes and Albrights of this world) at least used the language of principles and values to sell their interventions to the world, even as they follow the same philosophy as the Bushites: power over reality.
And therein’s the clue: the Empire is Nietzschean. Its world is devoid of reason, reality or principles, and contains only power and Will to Power. Continue reading “A Nietzschean Empire?”
Hey, red-staters: looking for some hot girl-on-girl Iraq liberation? I’ve got just the thing for you. (Warning: Not work-safe, unless you work at the Committee on the Present Danger.)
I love British tabloids – where do they learn to write like that?
Scott Peterson of the Christian Science Monitor:
Despite the steady rumble of fighting, from frequent artillery and rocket explosions, to bursts of small arms fire across the city, US forces entered a veritable ghost town.
Lt. Gen. Thomas Metz, commander of ground forces in Iraq and of the U.S. Army’s III Corps adds:
Speaking of al-Zarqawi, who is accused of beheading American and other hostages in grisly videotapes posted on the Internet, Metz said it was “fair to assume that he has left.”
Imagine that.
UPDATE: Or, as Matthew Yglesias says:
Boy — guerilla force flees rather than stand and be slaughtered by better-armed foe. Who could have predicted that except every goddamn person on the face of the earth.
So this is how Bush kicks off his second term. More bloodshed.
“Innocent civilians in that city have all the guidance they need as to how they can avoid getting into trouble,”How do they do that Rumsfeld? While tons of explosives are being dropped upon your neighborhood, how do you do that? Do you stay inside the house and try to avoid the thousands of shards of glass that shoot out at you from shattering windows? Or do you hide under a table and hope that it’s sturdy enough to keep the ceiling from crushing you? Or do you flee your house and pray to God you don’t come face to face with an Apache or tank or that you aren’t in the line of fire of a sniper? How do you avoid the cluster bombs and all the other horror being dealt out to the people of Falloojeh?
There are a couple of things I agree with. The first is the following:
“Over time you’ll find that the process of tipping will take place, that more and more of the Iraqis will be angry about the fact that their innocent people are being killed…”
He’s right. It is going to have a decisive affect on Iraqi opinion- but just not the way he thinks. There was a time when pro-occupation Iraqis were able to say, “Let’s give them a chance…” That time is over. Whenever someone says that lately, at best, they get a lot of nasty looks… often it’s worse. A fight breaks out and a lot of yelling ensues… how can one condone occupation? How can one condone genocide? What about the mass graves of Falloojeh? Leaving Islam aside, how does one agree to allow the murder of fellow-Iraqis by the strongest military in the world?
The second thing Rumsfeld said made me think he was reading my mind:
“Rule of Iraq assassins must end…” I couldn’t agree more: Get out Americans.
Looks like the missing missiles have been located.
