Prairie Weather

How scared should we be about Pakistan?

If you're looking for excitement and don't have much to worry about, here's a free panic attack.  Seymour Hersh has been exploring the issue of the safety and security of Pakistan's nuclear complex.  Here are a couple of excerpts from his latest article.

... Obama didn't say so, but current and former officials said in interviews in Washington and Pakistan that his Administration has been negotiating highly sensitive understandings with the Pakistani military. These would allow specially trained American units to provide added security for the Pakistani arsenal in case of a crisis.  At the same time, the Pakistani military would be given money to equip and train Pakistani soldiers and to improve their housing and facilities -- goals that Askfaq Parvez Kayani, the chief of the Pakistan army, has long desired. In June, Congress approved a four-hundred-million dollar-request for what the Administration called the Pakistan Counterinsurgency Capability Fund, providing immediate assistance to the Pakistan Army for equipment and training and "renovation and construction."

The secrecy surrounding the understandings was important because there is a growing antipathy toward America in Pakistan, as well as a history of distrust.  Many Pakistanis believe that America's true goal is not to keep their weapons safe but to diminish of destroy the Pakistani nuclear complex. ... A senior Pakistani official with close ties to [President Asif Ali][ Zardari exploded with anger during an interview when the subject turned to American demands for more information about the arsenal. After the September 11th attacks, he said, there had been an understanding between the Bush Administration and then President Pervez Musharraf “over what Pakistan had and did not have.” Today, he said, “you’d like control of our day-to-day deployment. But why should we give it to you? Even if there was a military coup d’état in Pakistan, no one is going to give up total control of our nuclear weapons. Never. Why are you not afraid of India’s nuclear weapons?” the official asked. “Because India is your friend, and the longtime policies of America and India converge. Between you and the Indians, you will fuck us in every way. The truth is that our weapons are less of a problem for the Obama Administration than finding a respectable way out of Afghanistan.”. ...

____

... A senior Obama Administration official brought up Hizb ut-Tahrir, a Sunni organization whose goal is to establish the Caliphate. “They’ve penetrated the Pakistani military and now have cells in the Army,” he said. (The Pakistan Army denies this.) In one case, according to the official, Hizb ut-Tahrir had recruited members of a junior officer group, from the most élite Pakistani military academy, who had been sent to England for additional training.

“Where do these guys get socialized and exposed to Islamic evangelism and the fundamentalism narrative?” the Obama Administration official asked. “In services every Friday for Army officers, and at corps and unit meetings where they are addressed by senior commanders and clerics.”  ... excerpts from a Seymour Hersh article in the 11/16 New Yorker

Sending damaged troops to Afghanistan

Tom Engelhardt has this, for an opener:

In a grim November 3rd Wall Street Journal piece (buried inside the paper), Yochi Dreazen reported record suicide rates for a stressed-out U.S. Army. Sixteen soldiers killed themselves in October alone, 134 so far this year, essentially ensuring that last year's "record" of 140 suicides will be broken. This represents a startling 37% jump in suicides since 2006 and, for the first time, puts the suicide rate in the Army above that of the general U.S. population.

After eight years of two major counterinsurgency wars (and various minor encounters in what used to be called the Global War on Terror), with many soldiers experiencing multiple tours of duty, with approximately 120,000 U.S. troops still in Iraq and almost 70,000 in Afghanistan, with the Afghan War clearly in an escalatory phase, commanders in the field calling for 40,000-80,000 more American troops, and base construction on the rise, the military's internal problems are clearly escalating as well.

As Dahr Jamail, author of The Will to Resist: Soldiers Who Refuse to Fight in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Sarah Lazare report, under these circumstances, the Army is digging deep for deployable troops; in fact, it's dipping into a pool of soldiers who have already been damaged or even broken by their experiences in our war zones -- and that's just to meet present deployment needs. ...more here

Terrorist attack in Texas. Which country to do we want to invade in retaliation?

Of course we need to turn the mad gunman at Fort Hood into a terrorist.  Now -- we need to  find a country we can justify invading.  Let's see.  What country do we need to control? 

Russia's too big (even though it does have a lot of oil).  But how about oil in Nigeria.  That nation's a mess anyway so what does it matter if we go in there, take control of the oil we don't already control, and make a worse mess?

I could be wrong.  Nigeria might not be the greatest idea.  Wasn't Obama born there?  Not Nigeria?  Can't remember which one.

Canada.  Canada has oil.  Canada is close enough to Killeen, Texas, to have been the perp behind the shooter.

Mexico's closer.  

Mexico.

Industry executioners sharpening their knives

Insurers do not like the provision to create a new government-run insurance program. Drug makers oppose billions of dollars in rebates they would have to give to the government over 10 years. Makers of artificial hips, heart defibrillators and other medical devices are not particularly happy about the proposed 2.5 percent tax on their products.

And employers large and small oppose rules that, for many of them, would make health care coverage — long a job benefit — become a federally mandated obligation.

That is why, as attention now shifts to the Senate, where Democratic leaders are trying to merge two bills into one, virtually every business group with a stake in the outcome will be hoping to strike at least a slightly better deal than they found in the House version. ... NYT

Me. Me. Me. Joe.

Joe Lieberman is like that awful kid in the back seat who's spent the entire trip yelling bad jokes in your ear.  You want to pull over and tell him to walk home.

Joe Lieberman has found two issues to keep him before cameras.  One:  let's investigate the Fort Hood killer and find his Muslim terrorist roots.  Two:  Watch me as I block a floor vote on the Senate version of health care reform legislation.

Democrats:  Pull over to the side of the side of the road and dump him off.

In short, big trouble ahead

Paul Krugman is not laughing -- and certainly not optimistic -- anymore.  The unemployment numbers are scary and they have consequences.

... The party of Limbaugh and Beck could well make major gains in the midterm elections. The Obama administration’s job-creation efforts have fallen short, so that unemployment is likely to stay disastrously high through next year and beyond. The banker-friendly bailout of Wall Street has angered voters, and might even let Republicans claim the mantle of economic populism. Conservatives may not have better ideas, but voters might support them out of sheer frustration.

And if Tea Party Republicans do win big next year, what has already happened in California could happen at the national level. In California, the G.O.P. has essentially shrunk down to a rump party with no interest in actually governing — but that rump remains big enough to prevent anyone else from dealing with the state’s fiscal crisis. If this happens to America as a whole, as it all too easily could, the country could become effectively ungovernable in the midst of an ongoing economic disaster.

The point is that the takeover of the Republican Party by the irrational right is no laughing matter. Something unprecedented is happening here — and it’s very bad for America.

In the absence of responsible leadership in the Republican party, the fringe -- the extreme right --   has taken over.  Congressional Republicans are trying to control it.  See, for example, the Hitler-sign-waving protesters on the Hill last week.

The key thing to understand about that rally is that it wasn’t a fringe event. It was sponsored by the House Republican leadership — in fact, it was officially billed as a G.O.P. press conference. Senior lawmakers were in attendance, and apparently had no problem with the tone of the proceedings.

During a nearly six-hour drive yesterday in heavy traffic and blinding downpours, I wondered why I wasn't elated at the passage of the House's health care reform bill.  The reason had to do with the realization, a couple of days ago, that it shouldn't have come first. 

A more complete and serious attack on unemployment and on the banks is needed and needed badly.  Today, not tomorrow.

Anh "Joseph" Cao

The demographics in Cao's district would seem to have given a picture of where he would come down on the issue, although Democrats have for weeks counted out any Republican support. He received no call from the White House early Saturday, unlike several Democratic leaders who were reportedly sitting on the fence. Cao (pronounced gow) represents an area in the southern part of Louisiana, which includes areas around New Orleans, that's affected by one of the highest rates of poverty in the nation. It's also a district that usually goes to Democrats, but due to some ethical questions surrounding his Democratic opponent last fall, Cao won one of the biggest political upsets of the year.

Following the vote Saturday evening, several Democratic lawmakers said that Cao did show signs that he was open to persuasion, having refused to make firm statements about how he would vote. Cao's timing also suggests that even before the late-night vote, he was confident in his decision. He pressed the 'yes' button several minutes before the voting window closed, meaning he wasn't planning to only vote yes in the final moments if absolutely necessary. ...Newsweek

Is there anything at all to like about Tim Geithner?

Gordon Brown suffered a rebuff from Washington yesterday after he signalled Britain's backing for plans for an international transactions tax on banks to help the world recover from the financial crisis.

At the G20 summit in St Andrews, Fife, the Prime Minister dropped Britain's longstanding opposition to the scheme, which could raise billions a year for poor nations.

But within hours of the significant shift in UK policy on the so-called "Tobin tax", the US Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner dismissed the move, saying Washington was "not prepared" to support it.

The Prime Minister called on the IMF urgently to consider the tax on financial transactions which experts say could raise as much as $600bn (£360bn) a year. Mr Brown said the financial collapse last year showed "there must be a better economic and social contract between financial institutions and the public based on trust and a just distribution of risks and rewards". ... Independent/UK

Afghanistan decision

The final decision on Afghanistan may not come for several weeks -- not until "after he consults with key allies and completes a trip to Asia later this month," according to a McClatchy reporter who has spoken with White House and Pentagon officials.

As it now stands, the administration's plan calls for sending three Army brigades from the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, Ky. and the 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum, N.Y. and a Marine brigade, for a total of as many as 23,000 additional combat and support troops.

Another 7,000 troops would man and support a new division headquarters for the international force's Regional Command (RC) South in Kandahar, the Taliban birthplace where the U.S. is due to take command in 2010. Some 4,000 additional U.S. trainers are likely to be sent as well, the officials said. 

The first additional combat brigade probably would arrive in Afghanistan next March, the officials said, with the other three following at roughly three-month intervals ... Jonathan Landay, McClatchy

Yes! Outta there!

No more Palestine-Israel peace talks.  Enough already.

“These two guys are watching a cowboy and Indian movie. And in the opening scene, an Indian is hiding behind a rock about to ambush the handsome cowboy,” he explained. “ ‘I bet that Indian is going to kill that cowboy,’ one guy says to the other. ‘Never happen,’ his friend answers. ‘The cowboy is not going to be killed in the opening scene.’ ‘I’ll bet you $10 he gets killed,’ the guy says. ‘I’ll take that bet,’ says his friend.

“Sure enough, a few minutes later, the cowboy is killed and the friend pays the $10. After the movie is over the guy says to his friend, ‘Look, I have to give you back your $10. I’d actually seen this movie before. I knew what was going to happen.’ His friend answers: ‘No, you can keep the $10. I’d seen the movie, too. I just thought it would end differently this time.’"

This peace process movie is not going to end differently just because we keep playing the same reel. It is time for a radically new approach. And I mean radical. I mean something no U.S. administration has ever dared to do: Take down our “Peace-Processing-Is-Us” sign and just go home. ... Thomas Friedman, NYT

We could say the same thing about Afghanistan (Friedman doesn't).  Maybe we don't like to admit we have a lot of work to to at home.  Maybe we use these mostly aggressive  foreign adventures to distract us from cleaning out our own house.  But our house needs peace, too.

Let’s just get out of the picture. Let all these leaders stand in front of their own people and tell them the truth: “My fellow citizens: Nothing is happening; nothing is going to happen. It’s just you and me and the problem we own.”

Indeed, it’s time for us to dust off James Baker’s line: “When you’re serious, give us a call: 202-456-1414. Ask for Barack. Otherwise, stay out of our lives. We have our own country to fix.”