[pbleighton]

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The president said an intelligence report (which turned out to be two years old) showed that Osama had been trying to send Qaeda terrorists in Iraq to attack America. So clearly, Osama is capable of multitasking: Order the killers in Iraq to go after American soldiers there and American civilians here. There AND here. Get it, W.?

The president is on a continuous loop of sophistry: We have to push on in Iraq because Al Qaeda is there, even though Al Qaeda is there because we pushed into Iraq. Our troops have to keep dying there because our troops have been dying there. We have to stay so the enemy doesn’t know we’re leaving. Osama hasn’t been found because he’s hiding.

The terrorists moved into George Bush’s Iraq, not Saddam Hussein’s. W.’s ranting about Al Qaeda there is like planting fleurs du mal and then complaining your garden is toxic.

Peter

[Winstonm]

Even if one were to accept the hypothesis of the dangers of Islamic funny-mental-ism, does it then follow that the neo-con objective of global imperialism is the correct response to the supposed threat? Or might there be another reason for war?

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"No matter what political reasons are given for war, the underlying reason is always economic."

~A. J. P. Taylor

Afghanistan economics:

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By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, December 2, 2006; Page A01

Opium production in Afghanistan, which provides more than 90 percent of the world's heroin, broke all records in 2006, reaching a historic high despite ongoing U.S.-sponsored eradication efforts, the Bush administration reported yesterday.

In addition to a 26 percent production increase over past year -- for a total of 5,644 metric tons -- the amount of land under cultivation in opium poppies grew by 61 percent. Cultivation in the two main production provinces, Helmand in the southwest and Oruzgan in central Afghanistan, was up by 132 percent

Iraq economics:

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From the office of Congressman Dennis Kucinich

WASHINGTON, D.C. (May 10) - Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) released the following statement after the passage of the U.S. Troop Readiness, Veterans' Care, Katrina Recovery, and Iraq Accountability Appropriations Act of 2007:

"There has been a broad deception about the content of the hydrocarbon law, a deception which has taken in members of Congress and the media. Misdescribed tactically as a revenue sharing plan, it is in fact a radical plan to privatize Iraq's oil.

"The law before the Iraq Parliament contains 3 vague lines about revenue sharing and 33 solid pages of a complex legal restructuring, facilitating the privatization of Iraq's oil resources. The sharing will not be 1/3 of 100%. The sharing is more likely to be 1/3 of 20% at most, after private oil interests take their cut. The stage is being set for theft on a historic scale.
"Iraq may have as much as 300 billion barrels of oil to be tapped. At a market value of $70 a barrel, the value of its oil may approach $21 trillion.

"In the past twenty four hours the Vice President made an extraordinary trip to Baghdad to urge the Iraqi Parliament to stay in session to pass a "hydrocarbon law" which provides for "revenue sharing." Today, President Bush explicitly mentioned that he could come to an agreement if it included a benchmark for "sharing oil reserves." This is the tone of the legislation which the House passed tonight

And for those who still believe we are there to fight the evil Islamists, I would say be sure to check your closets and under your bed before bedtime tonight for boogeymen, put garlic around your window sills to ward off vampires, and make sure it's the red pill and not the blue pill you take - reality is a nasty distraction and so much harder to believe than fantasy.