I saw "The Green Zone" this weekend. Essentially, as AO Scott noted, the film did a pretty decent job of distilling the events and politics of wartime Bagdhad into the action/thriller genre:
To anyone who was paying attention in 2003 and after, this is familiar territory. Mr. Greengrass and the screenwriter, Brian Helgeland, deftly glean material from the historical record, and while they compress, simplify and invent according to the imperatives of the genre - this is a thriller, not a documentary - they do so with seriousness and an impressive sense of scruples. They have clearly studied journalistic accounts of the early days of the war, citing Rajiv Chandrasekaran's vivid "Imperial Life in the Emerald City" as a particular inspiration, and while the picture they paint of infighting among the Americans and growing factionalism among the Iraqis may not be literally accurate in every particular, it has the rough authority of novelistic truth.
At the movie's core is the discovery by an Army officer, played by Matt Damon, that the US government's justification for invasion - Iraqi WMDs - was manufactured.
And watching it made me feel outraged all over again. If anything, the movie should be a reminder of how awful, how devastatingly awful the last administration was, how sick the invasion was, how wrong its supporters were - especially after it was evident it was a sham, a setup, a con job.
Naturally the movie is irking conservatives, who are busy trying to resurrect Bush's reputation. Ross Douthat takes a novel approach for a conservative, and pines for someone to depict the "complexities" of the war, instead of turning it into some over-simplistic story of good vs evil. ("If only Hollywood could be more like George W Bush," writes FDL's Blue Texan, "and embrace a sophisticated, nuanced, shades-of-gray type of worldview - rather than so clumsily dividing the world into good and evil." Or read Daniel Larison's complete smackdown of Douthat.)
Of course, in a way - and not the way Douthat intends - the move is a little over simplistic. For starters, in "The Green Zone," there's much surprise when no WMDs are found and there's shock when it's revealed that the administration had a hand in manufacturing WMD intelligence. Of course, by the invasion, it was pretty clear that there were no WMDs in Iraq, and that the intelligence from the Pentagon was suspect, to say the least.
That is, the move is an over-simplistic flick that augurs how the American public will remember the war, how most are already processing it. Basically, people are remembering that they were hoodwinked, when, in fact, most people had the evidence, heard the dissenting voices, and still supported the war. The public and the media galloped headlong towards Iraq under Bush's banner willingly, despite the plethora of reasonable and well-informed voices that showed there was nothing there...
Okay. So it looks like torture was, in fact, mostly used to extract false data to justify the invasion of Iraq. So much for the righties' ticking time bomb theories or all of those Philosophy 101 conundrums about the ends justifying the means, etc & co.
And now, with the cover sheets of Donald Rumseld's reports on Iraq to the White House published, it looks as if somebody thought the Iraq War was a big game, a new religious war, Christians vs. the infidels. And as Kossak LithiumCola noted, the release of these pictures are as likely - if not more likely - to inflame Islamic opinion against our troops than any pictures of torture would, it's pretty obvious the concern about the torture is really just a way to protect the Bush cabal.
So. Can we talk about prosecuting our nation's torturers yet?
The Bush administration applied relentless pressure on interrogators to use harsh methods on detainees in part to find evidence of cooperation between al Qaida and the late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's regime, according to a former senior U.S. intelligence official and a former Army psychiatrist.
It's pretty widely known that torture gets bad data. This is f*cking low. So we went to war based on "information" we tortured out of terror suspects?
Probably not much of a surprise to anybody that's followed the ins and outs of the Iraq War, but the Iraqi government is about to negotiate a deal that would give no-bid contracts to Exxon, Shell, Total, and BP to "service Iraq's largest fields":
The no-bid contracts are unusual for the industry, and the offers prevailed over others by more than 40 companies, including companies in Russia, China and India. The contracts, which would run for one to two years and are relatively small by industry standards, would nonetheless give the companies an advantage in bidding on future contracts in a country that many experts consider to be the best hope for a large-scale increase in oil production.
It's pretty obvious what's going on here. As Andrew Sullivan writes, "You don't get to conquer a new province and not get any spoils, do you? Who needs ANWR or a carbon tax when you can drain Iraq at record high oil prices?"
Not only do Exxon and Mobile get a sweet, no-bid deal from the Iraqi government, they'd get a fantastic boost from McCain's proposed corporate tax cuts and loopholes, which may have something to do with massive donations from the industry to McCain's campaign.
There's another connection in the no-bid deal to McCain's candidacy, explained by Matthew Yglesias:
The oil money more plausibly comes into play in explaining the desire to stay at war forever. After all, these companies (or their corporate ancestors) had oil contracts in Iraq in the past and now they're getting them back "36 years after losing their oil concession to nationalization as Saddam Hussein rose to power." Nationalization, you see, is a substantial risk of doing business -- especially natural resource business -- in unstable countries. But a given government is much, much, much less likely to nationalize western countries' assets if it's dependent on external U.S. military support and especially if its security services are nicely enmeshed with the U.S. military.
McCain, of course, wants to stay in Iraq - a hundred years, if need be. His Iraqi policy ties in neatly with ensuring that the Iraqi government - now, or in the future - never gets the pesky idea that it actually owns the oil found in its territory and has a right to determine its fate.
You can almost hear the squeals of delight - hey, this means cheap oil again! But these are people who don't care if burning oil (a) is creating a massive ecological and economic disaster, (b) spews harmful pollutants into the atmosphere, (c) and destroys irreplaceable, pristine wilderness. What's establishing an overseas colony with a permanent military presence to fight an endless war in comparison with cheap gasoline prices?
I admit the economy is bad enough for working families without factoring in rising gas prices, especially in the rural areas of our state. But shouldn't we be doing something about it, instead of pushing the problems off on others that will follow us? I wouldn't be averse to find some short-term temporary relief for gas consumers -- if we simultaneously applied ourselves to finding real long-term solutions to our oil-based economy.
I'm fine with leaving all the policy-making to the left. I know we can get us out of these scrapes. But I guarantee that many rigthies won't like the results...especially if they work.
If you aren't a regular reader of the right-wing blogs, you wouldn't be aware of their latest hysteria over a controversial proclamation made by the Berkeley, California, city council against the Iraq war. As is Berkeley's wont, they went overboard and said that Marine recruiters are "uninvited and unwelcome intruders," and sicced Code Pink on the city's Marine recruitment office by giving them a designated parking space in front of the office.
Right-wing hell broke out. DC politicos threatened to pull the city's federal funding, and a horde of pro-war demonstrated descended on Berkeley. Last night, the city council backed down.
Council members conceded that they had erred in passing a resolution Jan. 29 that condemned the Marines - rather than the war in Iraq - and some council members added that they felt they owed U.S. troops an apology as well the many Berkeley residents who were ashamed and offended by their position.
"To err is human but to really screw up it takes the Berkeley City Council," said council member Gordon Wozniak. "We failed our city. We embarrassed our city."
Exactly right. It's one thing to oppose the war and the president's policies, it's another to sanction or abet harassment of soldiers and recruits. To be fair to Berkeley, the Marine recruitment office was a physical manifestation of the government they dislike, which they view as aggressively forcing itself into their way of life. Their proclamation was a kind of Sagebrush rebellion, West Coast style. Emotional, angry, ill-considered.
And then there's the rhetoric from the right. Take Melanie Morgan, a radio talk show host (what else?), who was involved in the pro-war demonstrations. Berkeley-ites are "America haters," "Pinkos," "freaks," and "traitors." Those on "her" side are "patriots." There's an effort to somehow paint the city and its inhabitants as outsiders or aliens, fit only for contempt, and decidedly "un-American." Morgan:
Society for years has endured the freakish antics of Berkeley dwellers. Naked people streaking in the streets; smelly hippies begging for money as they sing drunken renditions of '60s anti-war songs; adults sitting in trees like a bad zoo exhibit.
But the Berkeley City Council and instigators from the extreme left have crossed the line this time. The council Tuesday night passed two anti-military, anti-American resolutions and agreed to send a letter to the city's only Marine recruiting office saying the military are "uninvited intruders."
This is treasonous, hateful behavior that steals the First Amendment rights of the Marines, the very group that protects our constitutional rights. What galls me most is that Berkeley is the birthplace of the modern free-speech movement and now it is has drawn battle lines in the war against the First Amendment.
In reality, what's going on here is that Berkeley is fighting for its particular brand of its world view. They are not unpatriotic. (One city council member who supported the proclamation is actually a Marine vet who fought in Vietnam.) And whatever their faults, they are absolutely, one-hundred-percent American. You may not agree with what they did - I certainly don't - you may dislike the image of Berkeley created for you by the Morgans of the world (the actual Berkeley in no way resembles the "freakish" hippie town Morgan would have you see), but you can't argue that somehow the city is an alien nation, outside the body politic. Berkeley is as American as Kansas.
What's going on here, is that the frothing right is putting Berkeley up as its scapegoat, an exaggerated caricature. It's an "other" subhuman collective that represents a threat to the paleo-conservative's particular and fantastic national mythos. (And liberals are the Fascists??) I guess these folks need to stay outraged to focus themselves at a time when their ideology and policies have proven themselves not only disastrous in practice, but wildly unpopular as well.
The heck with Congress' big stimulus bill. The way to get the country out of recession -- and most people think we're in one -- is to get the country out of Iraq, according to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll.
Pulling out of the war ranked first among proposed remedies in the survey, followed by spending more on domestic programs, cutting taxes and, at the bottom end, giving rebates to poor people in hopes they'll spend the economy into recovery.
Another interesting aspect about this poll is that "cutting taxes" came in third among polled Americans as best solution to the current economic mess. First was pulling out of Iraq, at 48 percent; second was "increasing government spending on health care, education and housing programs," at 43 percent; third was "cutting taxes," at 36 percent.
Just a poll, folks, move along. Nothing to see here. I'm not listening, LA LA LA...
The Bozeman City Commission is today considering a resolution against the Iraq War. If passed, Bozeman would join Helena , Butte , and Missoula as Montana cities that spoke out against Iraq .
Activists against the war have been gathering signatures for the debate since the commission narrowly approved considering the resolution. Opponents bang a familiar drum:
But critics say commissioners should spend their time on more pressing local business such as building a new jail and fire station.
"Resolutions like that really have nothing to do with the business of our city," Bozeman resident Mike Comstock said.
(Mike Comstock is a regular letter-writer to the Bozeman Chronicle, once claiming that traffic congestion in major cities is a result of liberalism. So we can probably suspect his opposition is ideological, not practical.)
I'm doubtful the commission will approve the resolution - after all, it was a 3-2 vote just to consider it. But then politicians, even local ones, are jumpy folks. I'd also have preferred a referendum. Let the people of Bozeman speak to their representatives directly, en masse. Still, here's to being optimistic about the resolution's passing. If the folks in Washington DC won't move, we need to give 'em a push.
Whoo-wheee! The spin is on! Now conservatives were always pretty bald-faced in lying about issues, creating rhetorical frames and policy to capitalize on non-existent issues they created. Gay marriage, flag burning, al Qaeda in Iraq. The list goes on. Here's the latest bullsh*t from Don Surber on Congress' low approval ratings:
Instead of addressing the energy crisis, tax reform, securing the borders or even increasing production of U.S. oil to end America's reliance on foreign oil, Democrats have one agenda item: Putting Bush's head on a plate.
[snip]
Instead of debates, we get stunts like this week's all-night filibuster.
Instead of compromise, we get up-or-down votes without amendments.
Instead of tackling problems, we get hundreds of investigations into Bush.
Instead of civility we get Democratic Senate Leader Harry Reid of Nevada taking a below-the-belt verbal jab at Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., and then making Specter wait 30 minutes to respond.
Democratic leaders want to do nothing. They want to portray Republicans as obstructionists and Bush as evil, in the hopes of securing the presidency in 2008 and a 60-vote majority in the Senate.
What planet does this guy live on?
People are p*ssed off because we're still in Iraq, we've still got crappy health insurance, we have to watch the richest in American reap all the benefits of a "growing economy," thanks to help from Republican government, while our tax rates rise, thanks to help from a Republican government. That's something that strategists on both sides agree on:
"The Democrats now own a share of discontent with national conditions, but it's a minority share. People still look to the White House and Republicans" as the people responsible for most of the discontent, said Andrew Kohut, director of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press.
As they should, because it's the President's war and Republican obstructionism preventing Democrats from ending it.
I know Matt's already written about the Senate's impending "true" filibuster happening tonight, but I just wanted to kick in my two cents: what a frickin' brilliant idea!
Bog Geiger has an excellent description of what to expect:
Reid could hold the Senate in continuous session overnight Tuesday and into midday Wednesday unless Republicans agree to a simple-majority vote on Reed-Levin.
Senate Democrats will then be prepared to take to the floor and speak all night and, if their Republican colleagues do not remain in the chamber, invoke ongoing quorum calls and other procedural maneuvers to force GOP members back to the Senate floor.
With the whole specter of cots being dragged into Senate cloakrooms and the pure theatrics involved, I'm hopeful this will shine a white-hot spotlight on the Senate's Republican leadership and show Americans how the GOP doesn't truly support helping troops and their families at home or extricating them from pointless involvement in the Iraqi civil war.
Cots in the cloakroom! The ringing bells of quorum calls! Bleary-eyed Senators discussing policy into the wee hours of the night! Finally! A little action in Congress!
Seriously, though. This is not only a great political gambit, it?s just a good idea. Finally, a discussion by our representatives about the Iraq War. Let everyone state their position. Let heads roll and reputations be made.
Okay politics junkies, it's time to pull out your handy-dandy, one-stop guide to the Defense appropriations battles currently raging in Congress.
Today, amendment #1 went down the tubes. Here's the rub:
Spotlighted by EC last month, Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) will propose a troop readiness measure increasing the amount of time active and reserve forces spend at home between deployments. While the precise numbers are unclear, if it passes, it will prevent the Pentagon from relieving units rotating out of Iraq in the spring with active-duty forces who haven't been home at for at least as long as their last tour, and three times as long for reservists. Due to the strain the four-year war has put on the military, Webb's amendment would very likely stop the surge by early 2008 and prevent any future escalation.
Seems a no-brainer, eh? Ensure that the national-security-endangering overextension of our military is curtailed, forcing the Bush administration to either make radical changes in how it acquires personnel (read, draft), or back down. IMHO, I think it's unwise to break our army on George W's personal war.
Domenici, a member of the defense appropriations subcommittee, is the fourth senior Senate Republican to sharply criticize Bush's war strategy in the past two weeks. He announced during a press conference in Albuquerque that he was co-sponsoring legislation that would embrace the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group, which called for a major redeployment that would leave only a limited number of troops in Iraq to focus on counter-terror operations and securing the border.
That such senior Republicans are speaking out against Bush's policy now is significant. The White House has been begging its Capitol Hill allies to hold off till a mid-September progress report from the Pentagon -- but the manner in which they're speaking out is just as significant.
Steve Benen notes that Domenici is up for re-election in 2008 (and has slipped in the polls precipitously because of his role in the prosecutor purge) and warns anti-war folks not to get too excited about folks like Lugar or Domenici, but agrees with Josh Marshall that we're headed in the right direction:
The key is -- for some liminal period over the next several months -- there's still a paradoxical safety in numbers for Republicans sticking with the president. But no one wants to be the last one to the door. If you're a Republican congressman and you've been carrying the president's water on Iraq for years you don't want to be on the losing side when Congress finally ends the war in spite of the president. At that point, even if you flip flop and start saying we've got to change course and try to get on the right side of public opinion, then you're probably doubly screwed. And if it's mid-2008 at that point you're really not in a good place.
Folks, this isn't going to be glamorous and exciting withdrawal from Iraq. It's going to be painful and slow and involve a lot of hypocritical rhetoric from Republicans on whose backs withdrawal rests. And I expect, when it's finally over, that there won't by any feeling of catharsis, only frustration.
Whooo-wheee! The Missoulian is at it again with its attempts to shake its "liberal reputation," this time with its commentary on the recent vote by the Missoula city council to allow the city's residents to vote on an Iraqi War referendum. In short, the paper's editorial board tells us to "zip it":
Decisions on military action taken by this nation against another nation are reserved to the representatives we elect to Washington, not City Hall.
We are entrusted with no more serious decisions than those we make, as individuals, in the voting booth and those we make, as a nation, in the halls of Congress.
And so we resist any initiative that could trivialize or misuse that decision-making process, as will the resolution to be presented to Missoula voters on November's city ballot.
Later on in the editorial, the Missoulian claims that the referendum would someone how infringe on Congress' right to decide on military action, although it's speaking about against a non-binding referendum, which reads (and is quoted in the editorial) "the citizens of Missoula, Montana, hereby urge the Congress...to authorize and fund an immediate and orderly withdrawal...from Iraq." Who could possibly interpret this as an infringement on Congress' constitutional obligations? I mean, besides the Missoulian?
There have been the usual complaints made from the usual corners:
...local jeweler, Jim Adair, who has a son in the Marines, echoed others in the crowd, maintaining the council has no say in foreign affairs and the measure is an insult to the armed forces.
"Not one of you were elected to advise the president or the Congress on international issues," he said. "If you want to do the right thing, support our troops."
First, every one of us -- every American citizen, man, woman, and child -- has the right to advise the President and Congress on international issues. Thus, the First Amendment.
Second, holding a referendum on Iraq is not an "insult" to the troops -- such an accusation is an insult. Expressing our God-given rights in a democratic forum is a celebration of our liberties and rights. Overextending tours of duty, denying veterans adequate health care, slashing veteran benefits, sending troops into war without the proper equipment and training, sending them on a mission with no discernable goal or strategy -- in short, treating each and every member of our armed forces as disposable trash -- all the while thwarting our democratic institutions here at home, that is an insult to the troops and to the people and country they fight for.
Shame on those council members who voted to deny Missoulians a voice in the biggest issue of our lifetimes. The only reason I can think of to block such a vote is out of fear of the outcome of the referendum. That, my friends, is a terrible reason to obstruct an election.
Congratulations to Mayor John Engen for casting the deciding vote.
For anyone who missed it, Tim Russert went on Hannity and Colmes recently and agreed to Sean Hannity's claim that "liberal bloggers" are pulling the Democratic Party to the left:
HANNITY: ...I think these bloggers have really gotten to them. I think they're really positioning themselves that they're going to have a very difficult time moving center. Do you see that?
RUSSERT: Absolutely, because what has happened -- the Democrats will acknowledge -- for example, on the war. The major candidates were very reluctant to consider voting and cutting off funding. Now, they will -- a year ago. Now, they will say that the circumstances on the ground have changed so much they want to make that vote. It was interesting to me that three senators elected this year, Democrats, Webb of Virginia, Sherrod Brown in Ohio, and Jon Tester of Montana, all voted for the funding, different than Obama and Clinton.
If it is true that "liberal bloggers" are pulling the Democratic Party left, that's a good thing. Not just because it happens to align with my own personal political opinions, but because it also aligns with the beliefs of a majority of Americans.
Geez, how did I miss this story that came out yesterday in DC's ultimate insider paper? The basic gist is that the left netroots seem to have little pull when it comes to influencing politicians once they get into power, as evidenced by Congress' recent blank check for Iraq handed to the President:
The power of the so-called netroots - liberal activists who rally likeminded supporters on the Internet - is not clear. They have a loud voice and they have the capacity to raise money quickly for a candidate they favor, but they so far have been unable to push House and Senate Democratic leaders on a range of issues, including ending the war in Iraq.
Yes, it's true. That's probably the problem with the netroots' style: we gather a large number of small donations. Apparently it's easier to move these guys if you give them one big check.
Isn't it funny? On the day the Democrats explain how capitulation on the Iraqi funding bill puts the Bush administration right where they want it - in the driver's seat apparently - a poll is released that shows opposition to the Iraq War is at its highest:
Six in 10 Americans surveyed say the United States should have stayed out of Iraq, and more than three in four say that things are going badly there - including nearly half who say things are going very badly, the poll found.
Still, the majority of Americans support continuing to finance the war, as long as the Iraqi government meets specific goals.
It's that second bit, of course, that?s driving Congress into the arms of the President.
