Breaking news....

Irish radio and various online news sources are saying that Israeli forces have been dropped into southern Lebanon, engaging Hezbollah forces in what is being described as the most serious breach of the five-day old ceasefire to date.

Hezbollah said its fighters clashed early Saturday with an Israel Defense Forces commando unit that landed near their stronghold of Baalbek deep inside Lebanon.

Lebanese security officials later said that three Hezbollah guerillas were killed in the fighting.

Earlier Saturday, Israeli aircraft fired several rockets at a target in a Hezbollah stronghold in eastern Lebanon early on Saturday morning, a Lebanese security source said.

Complete story here.

In combination with the following Guardian story, prospects for peace in the region seem fragile indeed.

An internal Lebanese army statement, circulated among forces in the past week, has called for troops to stand "alongside your resistance and your people who astonished the world with its steadfastness and destroyed the prestige of the so-called invincible army after it was defeated".
The circular has alarmed ministers in the Lebanese cabinet who had been calling for the army to disarm Hizbullah.

It will also fuel the concerns of Israel, the US and the UN security council that the Lebanese army is incapable of securing the south of the country, adding increased urgency to the calls for a multinational force to be swiftly deployed.

Why, if the Israeli army could not disarm or defeat Hezbollah, would the much less powerful Lebanese army be able to do so?! Especially considering it is composed, in no small part, of southern Lebanese recruits who would tend to sympathize with Hezbollah?

Seems more like wishful thinking than useful diplomacy to me.

Guardian story here.

UK gov rejects Ryanair's ultimatum....

Ryanair yesterday issued the British government with a seven-day ultimatum to restore security measures at UK airports to normal levels or face legal action for compensation for disruption to its services.

However, the British Department for Transport last night ruled out any imminent return to "normal" security measures. It said it had "no intention of compromising security" and did not anticipate changing requirements in the next seven days.

[snip]

He [Ryanair founder Michael O'Leary] said the airline was not that concerned about receiving compensation, and that it just wanted to get the airports back to normal. "This is about preventing a bunch of lunatics from changing our lives."

[snip]

"We are not in danger of dying at the hands of toiletries. Normal security measures have successfully prevented any terrorist attack on any British plane in the last 25 years."[emphasis mine]

O'Leary's on a tear!!

Now it remains to be seen if he'll follow up his threats to sue with action.

Complete story here (requires subscription).

It's something....

RALEIGH, North Carolina (Reuters) - A former CIA contractor was found guilty on Thursday of assaulting an Afghan prisoner who later died in a case that raised new questions about the treatment of detainees by U.S. interrogators.

David Passaro, a 40-year-old former Special Forces medic, was the first civilian to be charged with abusing a detainee in the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Prosecutors said Passaro beat Abdul Wali so badly he pleaded to be shot to end his pain. Wali died of his injuries two days after the interrogation in June 2003.

[snip]

Passaro was found guilty on a felony charge of assault causing serious injury and three misdemeanor counts of simple assault. He faces a maximum of 10 years for the felony and six months on each of the three misdemeanors.

HT to Crooks and Liars.

Complete story here.

(AP)

Another call for Israeli elections…

From Haaretz:

...Olmert promised to teach Hezbollah a lesson. But what has the enemy learned? That Israel doesn't have what it takes to win; that its ground forces, mostly reservists marched in after a month of aerial bombing, were poorly equipped, with substandard weapons and worst of all, inadequate training.

"When they sent us into Lebanon a few days before the cease-fire, we got the same kind of surprise as in the Yom Kippur War," a soldier stationed in Lebanon told me. "We were like sitting ducks. There was a sense of panic. We were surprised and helpless as the best tanks we own were ripped apart by the advanced technologies Hezbollah was using. All we cared about was scrounging for food and staying alive until the cease-fire.

"I'm starting to think that the chief of staff cooked up the stock scandal himself," the soldier went on. "Better to be sacked for a financial indiscretion than for bungling a war."

The outcome of the war up until now has exposed our weak points. Apart from President Bush, who says we won, our overuse of air power and the huge amount of damage we inflicted on Lebanon and Lebanese infrastructure has prompted the world to change its mind about the justification of our actions. Hezbollah survived with most of its arsenal intact, and can always count on its patrons to replenish it. That, together with the fact that it stands a good chance of becoming part of the Lebanese establishment and winning the elections, has prompted Assad Jr. to rattle his saber.

[snip]

With a million refugees wandering around the country, millions of dollars in economic damage and the trauma of thousands of missiles hitting our homes and cities, there is no question that the public is going to rethink its trust in a government that indulges in such hasty decision-making. With so many questions in the air, with a commission of inquiry, defiant citizens and a political tsunami on the way, it's time to get set for early elections.

Complete column here.

Fair play to him...!

I'm hardly Michael O'Leary’s biggest fan, on account of his company's vehement union-busting stance alone, but I have to applaud his latest move.

Not only the rightness of threatening the British government with a multi-million dollar compensation claim if it didn’t drop its ridiculous, nearly fortnight-long airport security requirements--confiscation of mascara, bottled water, deodorant and other everyday items, and banning of books, iPods and all carry-on luggage--but the brilliance of tying the move visually to RyanAir’s newest ad campaign.

Ryanair today threatened to sue the government for compensation unless airport security measures are returned to normal within seven days.

Michael O'Leary, the outspoken chief executive of Ryanair, described the new restrictions as "farcical Keystone Cops security measures that don't add anything except to block up airports", as he issued the ultimatum.

At a news conference in London, Mr O'Leary, described as "nonsense" the increased body checks and the new carry-on restrictions. Flanked by a Winston Churchill figure - in reference to the company's advertising campaign - he went on to say that the disruption at airports handed extremists a public relations victory.

[snip]

Mr O'Leary ridiculed the notion of searching five- or six-year-old children and elderly people in wheelchairs going to Spain. Such scenes, he said, would have "terrorists laughing in the caves of Afghanistan".

Or the cafés of North-East London, as the case may be.

Complete story here.

And now it's time to laugh….

This one had me howling!!! What a clever little guy!



[Repaired the link, 18/8/06 10 p.m.GMT]

Cafferty on FISA....

Cafferty is smokin' in this clip!!

(Sorry, I can't figure out how to embed the clip here, so you'll have to click below and view it on C&L.)

Video-WMP Video-QT 

(HT to Crooks & Liars.)

(See this excellent image in its original animated format here.

We're losing....

Still believe the Iraq war hasn't hurt US prestige abroad?

Then check out this poll, taken in America's closest ally in the ill-begotten invasion.

Four out of five Britons believe the west is losing the "war against terror" and want Tony Blair to distance British foreign policy from the United States, a poll revealed today.

[snip]

Tony Blair's policy of standing shoulder to shoulder with President Bush on foreign policy, most recently seen in his backing of the US stance in the Israel-Lebanon war, is only supported by 14% of the public, according to the poll.

At the same time, the poll showed that the British are becoming more hawkish, favouring the jailing of terror suspects for a full 90 days without charges (rather than the current 28 days) and believing that the West is fighting a third world war against global terrorism which threatens their way of life.

Complete story here.

Get rid of those dangerous liquids!

Airport madness....

I've known several people who've had the misfortune to have to fly since the "liquid bomb" plot was "foiled" in the UK.

I await real proof, in the form of criminal charges followed by convictions in an open court of law, before I believe there really was a plot. In the meantime, I'm scheduled to fly from Ireland to California in October and I'm desperately hoping the airline security madness has abated by then. Otherwise, I don't know how I'll manage such a long flight without my iPod! Not to mention, leave my laptop at home?!

The measures being taken--banning bottled water, confiscating mascara, and handcuffing panicky sexagenarians for trying to take a Pepsi to the loo--are truly ridiculous. Do they honestly believe terrorists are too stupid to switch tactics, and simply plant a more conventional device in the relatively unscreened checked luggage on domestic American flights? Or target a totally different vulnerability, such as subways, ports, or sports events?

Salon author, Patrick (“Ask the Pilot” ) Smith has written a couple of outstanding columns since the latest worldwide airport fiasco. This one, in which he refers to a "liquid bomb" plot foiled in 1995, is from today’s Salon:

..."We can't keep weapons out of prisons. How can we hope to keep them out of airports?" poses Bruce Schneier, a prominent security expert and the author of "Beyond Fear."

Eleven years ago we were sensible enough to accept this -- and it's not as if terrorism was something new, with the Lockerbie bombing and '93 World Trade Center attack still fresh in our minds. Lo and behold, no American planes were bombed with liquid explosives -- or any other kind -- in the interim. The true nuts and bolts of keeping terrorists away from planes, meanwhile, was going on out of view -- the responsibility of law enforcement and intelligence agencies, not part-time screeners at the airport. Numerous intelligence failures were brought to bear on Sept. 11, certainly, but unfortunately our initial reaction was to scapegoat airport security, whose role in the attacks was all but irrelevant. At the time, box cutters were not prohibited items. If they had been, the hijackers would have fashioned some other weapon.

[Snip]

Real security isn't glamorous. It doesn't result in splashy news stories and footage of stranded travelers sleeping on terminal floors. And every penny spent confiscating mascara is a penny that could be spent elsewhere in the security hierarchy. The key is getting the most bang for your security buck, and you're not getting a whole lot of bang -- and you're losing a whole lot of bucks -- with yet another clampdown on this or that dangerous item du jour.

"Exactly two things have improved airplane security since 9/11," Schneier says. "Reinforcing the cockpit door and teaching passengers that they need to fight back. Everything else has largely been a waste of money."

Complete column here (requires subscription or obligatory ad).

Oh, he didn't mean to hurt him....

The first American civilian, former CIA contractor, David Passaro, 40, (above) is standing trial on charges of mistreating an Afghan detainee.

The detainee, Abdul Wali, died after being beaten over a period of 48 hours during questioning about rocket attacks on a remote base where Passaro was stationed in 2003 along with U.S. and Afghan troops. Passaro is not being charged with murder.

Despite the fact that the CIA contractor, according to federal prosecutors, kicked Wali hard enough to lift him off the ground, while the prisoner's head was covered with an empty sandbag and his hands were bound--in addition to beating him with the flashlight--Passaro's defence attorney still contends he didn't mean to hurt the prisoner.

In closing arguments, the government said David Passaro beat detainee Abdul Wali with a flashlight “to inflict pain” and make him talk. Wali later died. Passaro's lawyer countered that the civilian contractor had only tapped the detainee and did not intend to hurt him. [emphasis mine]

Wow. I wonder what would have happened had they really intended to hurt him?

Complete story here. And more detail in Salon here (but requires subscription or obligatory ad).

Dead man walking....

Columnist Ari Shavit is reiterating his prediction that Israeli PM Ehud Olmert will be forced to resign (in today’s Haaretz).

Turns out, Olmert is facing harsh criticism not only for his conduct of the Lebanese invasion, but for a cushy real estate deal he and his wife entered into to purchase their new Jerusalem home for half a million dollars below market value. The State Comptroller's office is investigating.

...It is highly doubtful that Olmert could even temporarily survive such a police probe considering the present public mood. Chances are that within about two months he will no longer be Israel's prime minister.

When reporter Yoav Yitzhak exposed the affair of Olmert's house sale before the last elections, other journalists defended Olmert. They portrayed the experienced investigator as eccentric, helping to smooth Olmert's way to the prime minister's office. But as soon as honest professional officials became involved, the path led instead to investigating Olmert.

The significance is clear: politically, Olmert is a dead man walking. Whatever Yoav Yitzhak did not do, the State Comptroller's men will do. Whatever they don't do, the police will probably do. Whatever the police don't do, the public, hopefully, will do. This time the public will not be deceived or keep quiet. Its cry of outrage will rock the foundations.

Too bad American government is too corrupt and sycophantic to truly investigate Bush and Cheney's questionable business deals.

Complete column here.

Israeli troops rest and unload their gear near the Israel-Lebanon border after returning from military operations in southern Lebanon, August 8, 2006.(REUTERS/GIL COHEN MAGEN)

Cheerleader on the rubble….

As usual, Sidney Blumenthal delivers a salient analysis of Israel’s Lebanese debacle, in today’s Salon.

...Israel's strategic debacle was a curiously warped and accelerated version of the U.S. misadventure in Iraq. It used mistaken means in pursuit of misconceived goals, producing misbegotten failure. Rather than seek the disarmament of Hezbollah, Israel sought to eliminate it permanently. If the aim had been to disarm it, in line with United Nations Resolution 1559, Israel might have initiated a diplomatic round, drawing in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt, to help with the Lebanese government. But, encouraged by the Bush administration, Israel treated Lebanese sovereignty as a fiction. With U.S. support, Israeli unilateralism was unfurled. The possible consequences of anything less than stunning and complete triumph in a place where Israel had long experienced disaster were dismissed.

After having withdrawn in 2000 from its occupation of Lebanon, achieving few of the aims declared in the 1982 invasion, the Israeli government launched an air campaign that would supposedly extirpate Hezbollah. The wishful thinking behind the air campaign was similar to that of the Bush administration in its invasion of Iraq. Upon the liberators' entry into Baghdad, Vice President Cheney explained beforehand, the population would greet them with flowers. In Lebanon, the idea was that the more destruction wreaked by Israel, the more the population would blame Hezbollah. Of course, as common sense and every previous historical example should have dictated, the opposite occurred. When the air campaign obviously failed, the army was thrown into the breach, sent to relive Israel's 1982 agony. Cautions about repeating the past were ignored, and the past was repeated.

Israel's national security has never been so damaged and endangered. And none of it would have been possible without the Bush administration's incitement and backing at every calamitous turn. The further erosion of U.S. credibility has also been severe.

[snip]

It can be said with a high degree of certainty, not simply tragic precedent, that the Bush administration engaged in this latest fiasco by ignoring the caveats and worst-case scenarios that must have been produced by the intelligence community. It is inconceivable that there was no intelligence assessment of Hezbollah's military, social and political capabilities, along with a range of potential outcomes. Unquestionably, such documents exist. One of them might well have taken the form of a Presidential Daily Briefing, which would have been presented to Bush by National Intelligence Director John Negroponte. It is also inevitable to conclude that having been briefed, Bush heard only what he wanted to hear.

Afterward, as the Israelis tore at one another, Bush proclaimed victory, following his Iraq P.R. formula. While his phrases might be a tonic to his political base, the rest of the world, especially now the Israelis, receive it as the empty rhetoric it is. The more Bush declares success when there is failure, the more U.S. credibility is tattered.

My heading here is taken from a brilliant Blumenthal description of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. You must-read the whole piece here (requires subscription or obligatory advertisement).

The late, great Bill Hicks....

This brilliant clip begins with a riff on airport delays which is quite timely, though the subsequent hijacking jokes pull one up short in our post 9-11 era.

What would Hicks have made of our mad era, had he not been taken from us so shockingly young?

RIP. You are sorely missed.

I think we know the answer to this....

The fact that MSNBC is entertaining such a discussion is an answer in itself, isn't it?

(HT to Shakespeare's Sister.)

Break from the monotony....

Another fun video to cheer up. (HT to my friend, Jack!)

What a great idea!! The guy in pink stands out!

Sexy sexagenarian....

Light blogging over the past couple of days, as I've been both fighting a case of bronchitis and preparing for an important job interview, which took place this afternoon. Already found out I didn't get the job, too, they're leaning toward another candidate. Sad. I would've loved it.

Anyway, to cheer myself up, I'm posting this great video by two of my favorite rockers, David Bowie and Trent Reznor. (HT to Red State Son.)

Jeeze, hard to believe Bowie will be 60 on January 8th, isn't it?! Strangers used to say I looked like him when I first started transitioning.

Didn't bother me at all....

Kitty love....

Aww, why can't we all just get along like these two?

Defeating terrorism....

Glenn Greenwald is one of my favorite bloggers: astute, articulate, well-informed and thoughtful. This post on the apparent collapse of the Neocon's grand plans for the Middle East and the futility of addressing terrorism with military force shows him at his best.

…The blunt instrument of military force is particularly ill-suited to fighting a worldwide terrorism network, particularly one that spawns unaffiliated copycats. Nor is military force an effective way of attacking the "root causes" of terrorism, as the war in Iraq tragically illustrates. As a general matter, invading and occupying countries is a recipe for more terrorism, not less.

People like Sullivan seem to believe that because Islamic terrorism is such a serious threat, only a bold, audacious, totally unorthodox strategy is sufficient to deal with it. I very much question that assumption. There are no quick fixes when you are fighting an ideology. Like communism before it, I suspect Islamic fundamentalism will only be defeated through a slow war of attrition. Ideologies must die out, they cannot be killed.

Fighting terrorism effectively will involve working closely with other countries, even the ones we don't particularly like, to identify and cripple terrorist networks. Occasionally there will be ways to effectively use military force, like in Afghanistan, but these will be the exception not the rule. The most effective way to address the root causes of terrorism is to pursue policies that will hasten the spread of modernity, not just democracy, throughout the Middle East. When people have jobs and lives and hope, the ideology of jihadism will be far less appealing. But this process will take a long time, and we can't make it happen by brute force. We must be vigilant and patient. Very patient. The Cold War wasn't won overnight. But there were many points along the way where reckless ill-considered action could have been disastrous....

He’s also writing at Salon’s War Room now. I hope they keep him on, he’s a great addition to their lineup!

To read the complete post, go here.

(REUTERS/Ali Hashiso)

Breaking news....

Just heard on (Irish) radio NewsTalk 106 that Israel is expressing its willingness to negotiate the release of Lebanese prisoners in exchange for the release of the two Israeli soldiers whose July 12th capture was the excuse Israel used to invade Lebanon.

Hence, we arrive at the point of negotiation Hezbollah was allegedly seeking from the beginning of this madness. Only now, more than 900 Lebanese civilians and 100 Israelis have been killed, countless people severely injured, more than 1 million Lebanese made homeless, and millions (billions?) of dollars worth of Lebanese dwellings and infrastructure utterly destroyed.

The news report also said that as many as 24 Israeli soldiers were killed yesterday: the highest one-day toll for the Israeli army in this war to date.

Want to take odds that Ehud Olmert will be forced to resign?

If only his American enabler would be forced to do so as well.