How to read the news, Part 2 : Bhutto's son: Democracy is revenge

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, the son of the assassinated Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto, said Tuesday that he fully intended to take on a political role in his homeland but only after he has completed his studies at Oxford University.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has vowed to continue his family's involvement in Pakistani politics.

The 19-year-old gave his first full news conference since taking on the role of party chairman of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP), the party his mother led until her death two weeks ago.

Zardari said he was asked to take on the role because the party felt it was important to keep a link with his mother "through the bloodline."

This is not democracy. The party [ who's the party? 1-2 leaders? please explain, ] decided he should lead? The party is suppose to represent the people, not represent it's own best chances of getting into power. So let the people vote who should lead. This is a joke.

"I was called on and I stepped up and I did what I had to do," Zardari told an audience of reporters in central London.

Called on by whom? Perhaps in your own mind. And now once you have power will you wish to extract revenge for your mother? Can you act in the best interests of the country and not with tainted emotions from your mothers violent death? Has this even been discussed?

He paid tribute to his "courageous" mother. "We have lost our best hope but not our only hope," he said.

He said his mother's death had made him more "resilient."

Zardari will take no part in upcoming elections which will be contested by his father and Bhutto's widower Asif Ali Zardari.
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He should, or rather his party should take part in the elections, they have the responiblitty to do so. Hold quick party elections and then move on. If not, then this party is for the Bhutto's only. It's members be dammed.

Before a packed audience, the young student looked composed but admitted he was nervous as he asked members of the press to respect his privacy during his upcoming studies.

Zardari is studying history at Christ Church College and has three more years of his course to run.

Asked if he was afraid for his own safety in the wake of his mother's assassination, he said: "I fear for my privacy."

He said the best solution to tackling extremism was to end what he called the "dictatorship" rule of incumbent Pakistani leader Pervez Musharraf.

In charge in Pakistan since 1999, Musharraf has been criticized by the PPP for not doing enough to safeguard Bhutto, who died after her convoy was attacked by a gunman and suicide bomb blast when she was campaigning in the northern city of Rawalpindi.

Zardari said "dictatorship feeds extremism" and went on to accuse the United States of "supporting dictators."

Retoric at best. He may not like Musharraf, but the man has done what was asked of him to get the elections going. And Bhutto should be reminded his Grandfather was the one kicked out of politics for being corrupt. How can they replace a true dictator in elections? Huh?

Zardari, who has lived most of his life in Dubai and Britain following his mother's exile from Pakistan, denied suggestions that he would not be able relate to the Pakistani people.

He is the third generation of his family to assume a leading role in the PPP -- the party was set up by his grandfather Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, Pakistan's first elected prime minister.

Asked if he felt it was inconsistent with democracy to continue a dynasty, he said it was up to the Pakistani voters to decide. Elections are scheduled to take place on February 18.

I don't understand this, above he said he had no plans to do anything, here he mentions the elections. Listen little Bhutto, hold party elections and then join in the Feb 18th coutry elections and do your mother and democracy proud. Otherwise your just a Dynasty/Dictator of your own party hoping to manipulate the current leader out of his power.

Zardari made his first public appearance before the world only three days after his mother's death when he was announced as the new chair of the Pakistan's People's Party.
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During that appearance he spoke only briefly raising his voice as he invoked the words of his mother.

Nice, how touching. But once again not democracy. And to think the title of the article says that revenege would be getting democracy in Pakistan. CNN London must not understand what that is, or just blankets the populace with mindspeak all day.

Thinking for Yourself is Now a Crime

What was the greatest failure of 2007? President Bush's "surge" in Iraq? The decline in the value of the US dollar? Subprime mortgages? No. The greatest failure of 2007 was the newly sworn in Democratic Congress.

The American people's attempt in November 2006 to rein in a rogue government, which has committed the US to costly military adventures while running roughshod over the US Constitution, failed. Replacing Republicans with Democrats in the House and Senate has made no difference.

The assault on the US Constitution by the Democratic Party is as determined as the assault by the Republicans. On October 23, 2007, the House passed a bill sponsored by California Democratic congresswoman Jane Harman, chairwoman of a Homeland Security subcommittee, that overturns the constitutionally guaranteed rights to free expression, association, and assembly.

The bill passed the House on a vote of 404-6. In the Senate the bill is sponsored by Maine Republican Susan Collins and apparently faces no meaningful opposition.

Harman's bill is called the "Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act."When HR 1955 becomes law, it will create a commission tasked with identifying extremist people, groups, and ideas. The commission will hold hearings around the country, taking testimony and compiling a list of dangerous people and beliefs. The bill will, in short, create massive terrorism in the United States. But the perpetrators of terrorism will not be Muslim terrorists; they will be government agents and fellow citizens.

We are beginning to see who will be the inmates of the detention centers being built in the US by Halliburton under government contract.

Who will be on the "extremist beliefs" list? The answer is: civil libertarians, critics of Israel, 9/11 skeptics, critics of the administration's wars and foreign policies, critics of the administration's use of kidnapping, rendition, torture and violation of the Geneva Conventions, and critics of the administration's spying on Americans. Anyone in the way of a powerful interest group--such as environmentalists opposing politically connected developers--is also a candidate for the list.

The "Extremist Beliefs Commission" is the mechanism for identifying Americans who pose "a threat to domestic security" and a threat of "homegrown terrorism" that "cannot be easily prevented through traditional federal intelligence or law enforcement efforts."

This bill is a boon for nasty people. That SOB who stole your girlfriend, that hussy who stole your boyfriend, the gun owner next door--just report them to Homeland Security as holders of extreme beliefs. Homeland Security needs suspects, so they are not going to check. Under the new regime, accusation is evidence. Moreover, "our" elected representatives will never admit that they voted for a bill and created an "Extremist Belief Commission" for which there is neither need nor constitutional basis.

That boss who harasses you for coming late to work--he's a good candidate to be reported; so is that minority employee that you can't fire for any normal reason. So is the husband of that good-looking woman you have been unable to seduce. Every kind of quarrel and jealousy can now be settled with a phone call to Homeland Security.

Soon Halliburton will be building more detention centers.

Americans are so far removed from the roots of their liberty that they just don't get it. Most Americans don't know what habeas corpus is or why it is important to them. But they know what they want, and Jane Harman has given them a new way to settle scores and to advance their own interests.

Even educated liberals believe that the US Constitution is a "living document" that can be changed to mean whatever it needs to mean in order to accommodate some new important cause, such as abortion and legal privileges for minorities and the handicapped. Today it is the "war on terror" that the Constitution must accommodate. Tomorrow it can be the war on whomever or whatever.

Think about it. More than six years ago the World Trade Center and Pentagon were attacked. The US government blamed it on al Qaeda. The 9/11 Commission Report has been subjected to criticism by a large number of qualified people--including the commission's chairman and co-chairman.

Since 9/11 there have been no terrorist attacks in the US. The FBI has tried to orchestrate a few, but the "terrorist plots" never got beyond talk organized and led by FBI agents. There are no visible extremist groups other than the neoconservatives that control the government in Washington. But somehow the House of Representatives overwhelmingly sees a need to create a commission to take testimony and search out extremist views (outside of Washington, of course).

This search for extremist views comes after President Bush and the Justice (sic) Department declared that the President can ignore habeas corpus, ignore the Geneva Conventions, seize people without evidence, hold them indefinitely without presenting charges, torture them until they confess to some made up crime, and take over the government by declaring an emergency. Of course, none of these "patriotic" views are extremist.

The search for extremist views follows also the granting of contracts to Halliburton to build detention centers in the US. No member of Congress or the executive branch ever explained the need for the detention centers or who the detainees would be. Of course, there is nothing extremist about building detention centers in the US for undisclosed inmates.

Clearly the detention centers are not meant to just stand there empty. Thanks to 2007's greatest failure--the Democratic Congress--there is to be an "Extremist Beliefs Commission" to secure inmates for Bush's detention centers.

President Bush promises us that the wars he has launched will cause the "untamed fire of freedom" to "reach the darkest corners of our world." Meanwhile in America the fire of freedom has not only been tamed but also is being extinguished.

The light of liberty has gone out in the United States.

Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions.He can be reached at: PaulCraigRoberts@yahoo.com

How to read the news, Part 1: Iranian boats confront U.S. warships in Strait of Hormuz

Red are my comments.

Iranian boats confront U.S. warships in Strait of Hormuz

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/01/07/africa/iran.php?page=2

OK, the title could have been U.S. boats confront Iranian warships, but it is U.S. Press.

WASHINGTON: In a confrontation in the strategic Strait of Hormuz, five armed Iranian boats approached three U.S. Navy warships in international waters, taking aggressive actions in a brief weekend confrontation described by the Pentagon as "reckless and dangerous."

Humm, reckless? Why they are patrolling waters near their country. The US does it, every country does it. Just because your the USA doesn't mean your absolved from being watched in international waters near Iranian waters.

The incident Sunday, which ended after about 20 minutes without damage, shots being fired or anyone being hurt, took place as the three American vessels were sailing into the Gulf, said Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman.

Throw in the "without damage, shots being fired or anyone being hurt" to ensure those reading think of the possibility of death or damage even though there was none. Good one press !!! Those conditioned enough will subconsciously grab the shots fired or being hurt.

The Iranian government played down the episode, saying that it had ended immediately after the vessels recognized one another.

But Whitman and other U.S. officials described a tense confrontation in the strait, a narrow but vital passage through which millions of barrels of oil pass each day. Oil prices on world markets spiked briefly after the news, which was first reported by CNN on Monday morning.

Who is Whitman, should we care? Tell us who this person is and why he is the one telling as about the incident please. What did he describe ? Without that we are left to [ as the news media wants us to obliviously... ] to envision in our heads that tense moment and from those thoughts and emotions react to the so called confrontation.

Also, those friggen oil people sure are jumpy. They hear talk about boats going near each other and the price rose? Rose to what? Why did it rise? Spiked for how long? Should the OPEC council really worry about speculated and non-issue confrontations. Sure if war broke out or one country started a blockage thats news and hurts oil, but this was NOTHING... NOTHING at all. Shows how fake the rise and drop of oil is.

In Iran, the Fars news agency posted an article based on the CNN report in both Persian and English. But only the English translation gave a motive for the Iranian actions, saying that they had been a warning to the American vessels to stay away from Iran's territorial waters.

Good English news people. Now .... Fars posts news, OMG it's not exactly what CNN posted! OMG the end of the world. That Fars news must be corrupt. It's slanted towards it own country and people. Now that

The incident came at a time of considerable tension between the two countries, and a day before President George W. Bush was to visit the region for a weeklong tour aimed both at encouraging Middle East talks and conveying a message that Iran continued to pose a serious threat.

The White House on Monday called the Iranian action "provocative" and warned Tehran against any repetition.

The US is going to goto the Middle East and call the country dangerous and such, and the US is the noes saying we will take action is you do it again... hummm seems the US is the bully here. But the wording of course is to say "the US is the guardian of light and justice, so they can patrol the waters and Iran can't since they are bad people". Go fly a kite. The world is not yours to police America, sorry.

"We urge the Iranians to refrain from such provocative actions that could lead to a dangerous incident in the future," said Gordon Johndroe, a White House spokesman.

One Defense Department official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe early reports from the U.S. Navy's regional headquarters in Bahrain, said that the Iranian boats had made a radio threat that the American ships would explode.

Ahem, the part above says "who spoke on condition of anonymity". OK, thats like saying we can't proce it was said. Why bother saying it? Why like the above posts. To have you think of the threat. Look, someone somewhere said it was dangerous, so it must have been I could just as easily say: n condition of anonymity I know an Iranian who said that they were not even 10 miles near the US boats. It's a complete lie but if I put that in a news article the reader would NEVER know the difference. Thats just bad journalism. But news media don't care anymore.

The Defense Department official said the Iranian boats had dropped boxes in the waters behind one of the U.S. vessels, which could have been either mines or simply dummy boxes meant to test - and learn from - the American reaction.

"The five Iranian fastboats essentially came in and charged the ships," the Defense Department official said. The verbal warnings heard in English over the internationally recognized bridge-to-bridge radio channel said, "I am coming at you, and you will explode in a few minutes," the official said.

A few minutes later, one of the Iranian boats placed two white boxes in the wake of one of the U.S. ships, which caused another of the American vessels to take evasive action.

"Whether they're just testing us to learn about our procedures, or actually trying to initiate an incident, we don't know," the official said.

The five fastboats were identified by Defense Department officials as belonging to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Traditionally, the Guard's maritime forces have operated in a far more hostile manner than the regular Iranian Navy.

"We have found in the past that the regular Iranian Navy was a courteous and professional organization, and our relations are as we would have with any other navy in the world," said a Pentagon official who has studied the issue. "The IRGC navy has a tendency to act in these unprofessional ways and to be very provocative at times."

Last March, Iranian Revolutionary Guard sailors seized 15 British sailors in waters that the British government insisted were international and held them for nearly two weeks.

At least unlike the British, they didn't dress like Iraqi's and kill iraqis to cause in fighting, or other black operations. http://rawstory.com/news/2005/CAUGHT_RED__0923.html
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/138504-Suicide+Bombings+-+A+Favourite+US+Counter-Insurgency+Tactic

In actions last year that brought immediate expressions of concern from senior navy and Defense Department officials, the Iranians began operating in ways that led American officials to believe that Iran had turned command of its naval missions in the Gulf over to the Revolutionary Guard and stripped the regular Iranian Navy of that responsibility.

As the Iranian boats approached, the U.S. warships issued warnings and "conducted evasive maneuvering," Whitman said. The U.S. warships, he said, were "prepared to take appropriate action."

The United States has conducted significant war games to prepare for the scenario that unfolded over the weekend, as navy officers have expressed concerns that the smaller Iranian fleet would choose to confront U.S. warships by swarming with larger numbers of smaller craft.

In an interview in Bahrain last month, Vice Admiral Kevin Cosgriff, commander of U.S. naval forces in the region, said that while Iran was unlikely to try to close the strait, it might take actions to intimidate U.S. allies in the Gulf and to illustrate its ability to damage global prosperity.

"I wake up thinking about Iran, I go to bed thinking about Iran," Cosgriff told reporters traveling with Defense Secretary Robert Gates during a visit to Bahrain.

What the fuck does that have to do with anything? Your in the army, your near Iran. I bet more Iranians dream about the masses of US Warships and Aircraft Carriers near their counrty then you do sir. Another stupid part of the news story to drum up your emotions and get you against the nightmare, sleepless night causing evil Iranians.

Nazila Fathi contributed reporting from Tehran. Who cares, o look an Arab name. Must be impartial right. Maybe. But she's american and works for the NY Times.

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/f/nazila_fathi/index.html