Allowed HTML - you can use: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

310 thoughts on “The Quest for Somali Oil”

1 … 8 9 10 11
  • Mary

    From an e-mail ex Cynthia McKinney
    .
    Hello! It’s amazing what one can learn just by talking to strangers who can become acquaintances. I want to get this out there because I was stunned when my waitress made the comment as I was complementing her on her cheerful attitude, her pretty eyeshadow, and other small talk. She announced that she was really not that cheerful about the fact that her sister, in the U.S. military, had just received her orders to report to Syria and that her sister would be shipping out very soon. Imagine that. U.S. troops headed to Syria. Did our President make that announcement to the people of this country?
    .
    U.S.forces now reportedly all over the oil-producing areas of Libya and in the desert reportedly spying on the other countries of the region from a secret drone base. View the video here: algeria-isp.com/actualites/politique-libye/201112-A7555/libye-une-base-militaire-secrete-americaine-francaise-libye-katroune-video-voir-decembre-2011.html
    .
    U.S.combat troops currently roam throughout central Africa having been deployed by our President to Uganda, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, and every other country that received the message loud and clear from our President’s previous Africa deployment–Libya–about what could happen if the leadership of that country refused cooperation with the Obama military and hence, says “yes” to the presence of foreign troops on their territory. Of course, this offensive deployment was made under an appropriate cover story that, for those familiar with the region, is clearly only a cover story and a not-very-credible one, at that. Watch this video at: aljazeera.com/news/africa/2011/10/20111014174712102972.html.
    .
    Drone bases are in Kenya, Djibouti, Seychelles, Ethiopia; and the Obama Africa policy has succeeded in ensuring that Kenyans now fight and kill Somalis on the ground while drones fire missiles from the sky washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-building-secret-drone-bases-in-africa-arabian-peninsula-officials-say/2011/09/20/gIQAJ8rOjK_story.html
    .
    This is going to continue, folks, until the people of this country say no. Please let our President know that he must act immediately to bring all of our troops home, stop the CIA drone bombings, and adopt a military policy of non-intervention in other countries. Please send that message now:whitehouse.gov/contact/submit-questions-and-comments.

  • Mary

    McShane again at the Henry Jackson Society. With Cotler. More demonization of Iran and Ahmadinejad.
    .
    Media Launch of the Responsibility to Prevent Coalition
    with The Hon. Dr Irwin Cotler MP
    .
    By kind invitation of Dr Denis MacShane MP, The Henry Jackson Society was pleased to host a discussion with the Hon. Prof. Irwin Cotler MP, former Canadian Minister of Justice and Attorney General, International Human Rights lawyer and Member of the Canadian Parliament. Professor Cotler launched the international report on Responsibility to Prevent Coalition and discussed the human rights abuses in Iran, with a particular focus on incitement to genocide.
    .
    /..
    http://henryjacksonsociety.org/2010/06/30/media-launch-of-the-responsibility-to-prevent-coalition/

    .
    While you are there look up Davis Lewin on About Us! Lovely man.

  • Komodo

    Irwin Cotler is a member of MEMRI’s Board of Advisors (http://www.memri.org/content/en/about.htm)
    Cotler’s wife, Ariela, is a native of Jerusalem and worked as a legislative assistant to the Likud members of the Israeli Knesset from 1967 to 1979.
    Despite his liberal sympathies in other directions, I think we have it in a nutshell there.

  • Komodo

    Thanks for Davis Lewin, Mary. I won’t post his blog address, as I do not want unfavourable comparisons with poisonous reptiles to be made. He’s a worthy challenger to Mel Phillips, and he writes in red ink.

  • Uzbek in the UK

    “And I thought the BBC was bad. You are paraphrasin a World Bank report on Georgia, which is hardly a source of impartial facts, although I like the addition of “according to Georgians themselves” to give it some cred.”
    .
    Well it would be interesting to know how many (including DownWithThisSortOfThing) on this board have actually spoken to Georgians yet alone been to Georgia.
    .
    Why would anyone thought that one would rely on the report from World Bank. Organisation that from its beginning has always been Uncle Sam’s long arm.
    .
    My judgment on Georgia based on conversations with Georgians. Most of whom have no relations to the government and yet most of whom stated that things changed for better since “old fox” (this how Georgians call their former president Shvarnadze) was kicked out. One other thing to mention here about “old fox” is that since he was kicked out he visited Uzbekistan and strongly recommended to Karimov to monitor activities of all EU and US sponsored NGOs. Not to mention here that Karimov did much better, few weeks from receiving such advice from “old fox” Karimov shut down all foreign NGOs in Uzbekistan leaving Human Right abuses in Uzbekistan without any criticism.

  • Uzbek in the UK

    Nevermind
    “The forces that have torn Russia apart’, what an expert analysis of western pressure on Yugoslavia, East Germany, Radio Liberty must have been a commercial pop station and untold cold war campaigns to undermine the warsaw block were just rethoric, they never happened did they?,”
    .
    Well unless you are paid to write what you write, your mind was most definitely deeply f..ked up by this sort of nonsense. Have you ever been in USSR in 1970 or 1980th? System that was built since 1917 was not type of medieval feudal dictatorship that could have easily been torn apart by freedom slogans from Radio Liberty. Children since they learnt how to read saw picture of Lenin in their first ever book, with few of his “wisdom” words. And until one is buried in his grave one was told again and again about Great Course of Communist Party, the only free and true peoples party. Soviet society was Spartan society virtually cut off from the rest of the world. System like Soviet Society needs much more to be brought down than Radio Liberty, CIA conspiracy or cry of few sleazy western liberals.

  • Uzbek in the UK

    Mark Golding-Children of Iraq
    .
    Can I conclude from your last posting that you are perfectly comfortable for Russia to play its negative role in preventing any sort of positive developments in former USSR as LONG AS Russia at the same time counter balances US on the Global stage? Can I assume that you are perfectly happy with sacrificing 140 millions of Russians and over 100 millions of others in former USSR to KGB led Russian (what is now becoming clear apparatus dictatorship) leadership that is in close collaboration with despotic regimes deprive people in former USSR freedom and true sovereignty?

  • nevermind

    Irwin Cotler has liberal sympathies?, Komodo, your breakfast was too fresh you should have left it to rot a little loner in the sunshine.
    Just read Mary’s link on his visit to the H. Jackson Soc., he said this

    “What we are witnessing today is the toxic convergence of four distinctive but interrelated threats; the nuclear threat, the incitement to genocide, the terrorist threat and the mass domestic repression. Regrettably the international community, though necessary, has only has been focusing on the nuclear threat. It has marginalised the other threats by a single minded focus on the nuclear threat. I do not want any adverse inference drawn from what I have said. I believe that the nuclear threat is a clear and present danger but I also believe that the massive domestic repression in Iran is a matter of clear and present danger and we have to look at it in a composite way. ”

    How many donations has Mr. Cotler MP attracted from Bicom one wonders.

  • technicolour

    Nevermind: yes, I think you must mean the USSR, not Russia. What Yugoslavia or East Germany have to do with it, even then, I don’t know. East and West Germans alike detested the Wall: the capitalism which triumphed afterwards was shocking to many, but on a different level to the Stasi. You know very well that you were attacking Uzbek in the UK with your rhetorical assumptions. I’m sure we would all want our state broadcaster to be delving rather further into reality and therefore serving the people who pay it, and not just broadcasting government propaganda: something which is occasionally attempted on Newsnight; and through the documentaries of Adam Curtis, for example. Btw I am as sure as one can be that Tony Blair lied to Parliament: your point? Mine was that in the context of appealing to Putin it was irrelevant, as, in any context, is his sexuality.

    Mark: I know that you do not demonise Israelis. I have lived in Russia and among Russians and was therefore astonished by the lack of knowledge about Putin and his past. I can see a point of view which says that it is better to have Russia controlled under a strong leader than left to chaos, and this may be true, given Russia’s history. However, to pretend that he is not openly suppressing opposition is incomprehensible, I think.

  • Uzbek in the UK

    Technicolour
    “I can see a point of view which says that it is better to have Russia controlled under a strong leader than left to chaos, and this may be true, given Russia’s history.”
    .
    Well, to me the only fear of leaving Russians to chaos is future of their nuclear arsenal (believed to be the largest). All other arguments in support of this point are false and used as excuse to depriving Russians basic rights. This for instance is used as favorite arguments of Putin and his allies that if it was not for him (them) Russia would have been divided and colonized by foreign enemies (this is not new and Stalin as well as other soviet leaders successfully used enemies of the state argument to excuse repressions). Why nobody blames foreign conspiracy when students demonstrate in London, or when Occupy movement occupies places, or when even riots are taking place and WHY Putin and other in former USSR always blame foreign conspiracy when anyone is brave enough to come out to the streets and state their dissatisfaction with government policy?

  • Komodo

    Irwin Cotler has liberal sympathies?,…
    He (unsuccessfully)supported the decriminalisation of cannabis, and has been active in supporting relief work – not just in Israel. Fair’s fair.

    “What we are witnessing today is the toxic convergence of four distinctive but interrelated threats; the nuclear threat, the incitement to genocide, the terrorist threat and the mass domestic repression. Regrettably the international community, though necessary, has only has been focusing on the nuclear threat. It has marginalised the other threats by a single minded focus on the nuclear threat. I do not want any adverse inference drawn from what I have said. I believe that the nuclear threat is a clear and present danger but I also believe that the massive domestic repression in Iran is a matter of clear and present danger and we have to look at it in a composite way. ”

    Which could plausibly be taken as fitting with his interest in humanitarian matters: or it could be taken as echoing the Voice of Israel. As I said (if you’d read my post), his status re. MEMRI (founded by Meyrav Wurmser and sundry other pondscum) inclines me to believe the latter.

    How many donations has Mr. Cotler MP attracted from Bicom one wonders.
     Not many, I’d guess. More likely CJPAC – he’s Canadian. Never assume – check.

  • nevermind

    Late up today technicolour,nevermiond, you must get straight back to the old business of shoving words into peoples mouth.

    I want to make this clear, I was not attacking Uzbek by calling him a renegade, if anything I meant the opposite, a renegade is someone else’s freedom fighter,imho.

    Thanks for putting me right on that Komodo, off course if he wants to free the weed he must be a liberal.
    I do not think talking of multiple perceived threats could be construed as humanitarian concerns, but hey, who am I to say this, there are people on here who are better educated than myself.

    Whether he is a MP for HMG here, or in oppressed Canada, makes no difference to me, I’m sure there is a canadian equivalent of BICOM, it could not possibly have escaped the attention of zionist foreign policy divertions.

  • Komodo

    Clearly a misunderstanding here, nevermind. You invited me to read the linked page. (I had). The purpose of the meeting was to present our humble subject nations with an agenda they can follow in order to preserve and if possible increase Israel’s pre-eminence as G_d’s Chosen ™ Terrorist State. The problem regarding Cotler is not that he is an evil jooo. The problem is that he is quite a “good” one, in every other respect (his humanitarian record being infinitely better than mine, and probably yours) and that he evidently has something of a blind spot when it comes to Israel. He has even defended Palestinians in Israeli courts…
    I don’t think there’s any purpose to be served by demonising him. We should, rather, point out the inconsistency in his position and urge him and other useful idiots blinded by nationalistic Judaism to distance themselves from the psychopaths actually setting the agenda.

  • nevermind

    Looking at it from your viewpoint you have a case in point,Komodo, leaves to be seen whether he supports these young refreshing students and activists.
    http://jewishvoiceforpeace.org/

    Although reading his eight principles and plan for Palestine and of his support for the two state solution, I can’t see the above happening.
    http://irwincotler.liberal.ca/op-ed-2/national-post-irwin-cotler-eight-principles-for-israeli-palestinian-negotiations/

    I agree there’s some potential for liberalism in what he does.

  • nevermind

    my reply to you got swallowed komodo, most likely due to the two links I included. I concure with your analysis of his liberal work.
    Should Irwin support http://jewishvoiceforpeace.org/ and its young activists and students, then he will be a usefull conduit between the hardline stoics and a new agenda.

    Don’t know whether his eight principles for negotiations with Palestinians, as his support for a two state solution will work for a future Palestine.

  • technicolour

    NB I don’t, personally, believe that the Russian people need to be ‘controlled’.

  • technicolour

    “I want to make this clear, I was not attacking Uzbek by calling him a renegade, if anything I meant the opposite, a renegade is someone else’s freedom fighter,imho.”

    Then my apologies – and thanks for making it clear.

  • nevermind

    Excellent find mark G. What of this little nuggett at the end of the sixth paragraph.

    “Air Force Intel guy is most
    obsessed with the challenge of taking out Syria’s ballistic missile
    capabilities and chem weapons. With Israel rgiht there and the regime
    facing an existential crisis, he sees that as a major complication to any
    military intervention.”

    This existential crisis, no doubt coming from the fact that Israels population is fed up with wars and opposed to them by a large majority. Israel has lost the information shut down, its own population is leaving in droves having had enough of zionist zeal and wars with the neighbours in perpetuity, understandably so. Bibi has only got settlers and a few Likud supporters to count on, thats why he is reluctant to crack down on settlements and please the US. Thats why he has US soldiers in Israel, permanently, to uphold the agenda of multinationals thats use Israel as their attack dog to get their way.

    Off course, if it means that they are also available for a mission, or to train insurgents, is a bonus. But it will further alienate the moderate majority, now they have US soldiers on their streets, not just their own. Those numbers leaving Israel will go up and ‘little Satans’ last stand at AIPAC was a mere reiteration that the US is full square part of their struggle now, that they will have to pick up the tab should Israel be subsumed from within.

    Thanks, an eye opener.

  • angrysoba

    Nevermind: mary, apart from the Soufan group, who seem to keep mark pritchard as their ‘in the House’ pet, he has also crossed swords with Flashman over animal rights.

    .
    Don’t insult Flashman with that comparison to Cameron. For one thing, Flashman was a very keen and astute observer of politicians and their holy hypocrisies:
    .
    Here he is on Russia:
    .
    the Russians will always be slaves – so will the most of mankind, of course, but it tends to be more obvious among the Ruskis.
    For one thing, they look so damned slavish. I remember the first time I really noticed serfs, the first day’s drive out of Taganrog. It was at a little village post-station, where some official was thrashing a peasant – don’t know why – and this dull clown was just standing an letting himself be caned by a fellow half his size, hardly even wincing under the blows. There was a little crowd of serfs looking on, ugly, dirty-looking rascalsin hairy blue smocks and rough trousers, with their women and a few ragged brats – and they were just watching, like cowed, stupid brutes. And when the little official finally broke his cane, and kicked the peasant and screamed at him to be off, the fellow just lumbered away, with the others trailing after him. It was as though they had no feeling whatever.

1 … 8 9 10 11

Comments are closed.