17. mai 2004

Moore at home in Cannes Fictious documentarist Michael Moore came to his own in French Cannes, and he delivered the expected Bush bashing to the masses. And that is precisely the "message" of his new film "Fahrenheit 9/11." He may have overdone his propaganda tricks this time, though, as even Reuters describes the movie like this: The Oscar-winning director's fast-moving film is a telling work of propaganda by a moviemaker whose mission to deride Bush exudes from every frame. Maybe too much even for the Acadamy, then. But you never know. 10:28:55 PM    comment []  trackback []

Hooray for the 17th of May! Today the 17th of May we celebrate our Constitution Day in Norway. The weather here in Bergen left something to be desired, though, so the scenery is nothing like last year. Here's a good page about the 17th of May. 10:13:42 PM    comment []  trackback []

Evolution and the Bible The God Squad tries to make a compromise where both evolution and the Bible can be sort of true, but as the Raving Atheist points out, they don't really get their facts right. It is surely true that there is no strict contradiction between accepting evolution and believing in God or Christianity, but not if you insist on taking Genesis as a literal description of historical facts. And why does so many who have no clue what evolution is nevertheless insist on writing about it? 7:38:43 PM    comment []  trackback []

Brian Chontosh - Hero We're practically on first-name basis with the thugs who disgraced their uniforms by abusing prisoners in Iraq, but you probably never heard of Marine Capt. Brian Chontosh of Rochester, N.Y, who just received the Navy Cross, the second highest award for combat bravery in the US, for his decisive leadership and bravery when his platoon was ambushed marching into Baghdad a year ago. Read what he did! I would not have heard about him if I hadn't seen the story confirmed as true on Snopes. The story is not precisely splashed across the front pages. 7:24:11 PM    comment []  trackback []

Nerve gas artillery round explodes in Iraq An artillery round with a small amount of the deadly nerve gas sarin has exploded in Iraq. Two persons who were exposed to the gas are under treatment. The substance was found in an artillery shell inside a bag discovered by a US convoy a few days ago, he said. It appears to be the first evidence of nerve gas existing in Iraq since the start of the US-led war last year.  Inside a bag? Was it being prepared to be used in a terrorist attack? So, we can now conclude that Saddam did have WMDs, and that at least some of them are still on the loose. This was not the preferrable way to find Saddam's nerve gas, I have to say. Update: CNN has more details. American-led coalition forces in Iraq found sarin gas in an artillery round that was rigged as an improvised explosive device, U.S. Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said Monday. The device went off before it could be disabled, Kimmitt said, causing a "small dispersal" of the nerve agent. Two members of an explosives ordnance team were treated for minor exposure, he said. Kimmitt said the artillery round was of an old style that Saddam Hussein's regime had declared it no longer had after the Persian Gulf War. He said it was designed to explode after being fired from an artillery piece and that its effectiveness as an improvised explosive device was "limited." If the terrorists got them first, it is safe to conclude they must have had contact with regime bosses who knew their whereabouts. I am relieved they would be of limited use now, but it is still a scary prospect. Update 2: Fox added an important detail: He said he believed that insurgents who rigged the artillery shell as a bomb didn't know it contained the nerve agent, and that the dispersal of the nerve agent from such a rigged device was very limited. [bold added] As I understand it, the militants use old military explosives to make their improvised roadside bombs. So this means, I guess, that among ordinary artillery shells spread all over Iraq there may be WMDs. The task group has probably been busy the last two days, then. 5:36:09 PM    comment []  trackback []

Iraq Governing Council leader assassinated Ezzedine Salim, the head of the interim Iraqi Governing Council has been killed in a car bombing at a checkpoint just outside the green zone in Baghdad. Eyewitnesses say there were many casualties. The attack was a suicide bombing. The Arab Resistance Movement al-Rashid Brigades posted a statement on the internet saying it had carried out the attack. The group said two suicide bombers had been used to carry out "a qualitative heroic operation, which led to the killing of the traitor and mercenary" Ezzedine Salim. "The Brigades pledges to the masses of our nation to pursue struggle until the liberation of glorious Iraq and dear Palestine," the statement on al-Anbar website said.  One should believe security for GC members would need to be increased a notch or two these days. 4:11:20 PM    comment []  trackback []

In Iraq, this is the time to stand firm The Abu Ghraib scandal has been a horrible PR disaster for the coalition's effort to bring democracy and human rights to Iraq. Enemies of democracy have, along with domestic opponents to the war, made serious attempts at tearing the west down from the moral high ground. Make no mistake about it: what happened in Saddam's old prison has undermined the will to fight this war to victory, both in Britain and the United States. Bush and Blair both realise that a prolonged conflict in Iraq can easily cost them their jobs in the next election. But this is much bigger than the two leaders. Remember that the "they're botching it" meme is as old as the war. When the rapid advance towards Baghdad seemed to stop for a few days, and irregular fighters caused casualties, the media was a crescendo of voices telling how wrong the war plan has been. Even this blogger, emberrassingly in hindsight, started to wonder if Rumsfeld and the Pentagon had underestimated the task ahead. Not much more than a week later, victorous American troops captured Baghdad. The meme, however, has been extremely hard to squash. Wars are always messy, mistakes are made, crimes are committed and tragic casualties happen. In a half full, half empty fashion, there has never been any doubt what version the media would choose. Do you remember the plundering of the museum of Baghdad, the lack of electricity and water, and countless examples of unrest and problems. Every one of those problems, and the increasing death toll from regime remnants and an inrush of foreign militants were given as reasons for the war going badly. And Saddam was still at large, for a while anyway. Just a few weeks ago, the combined troubles caused by unrest in Fallujah and Al-Sadr's uprising was described as a "perfect storm" that would totally throw the coalition effort into disarray. Fallujah is now relatively peaceful, and al-Sadr's militia is being systematically destroyed. And now, the horrible prison photographs, confirming that among coalition troops there are men and women that do not deserve to wear their country's uniform.. The conclusion has remained the same. The reasons have changed, week by week. I am thinking back to the almost unanimous conclusion from pundits at the end of March 2003, concluding that the coalition forces' progress had ended. I am not saying the war is going well. I honestly don't know. The fog of war is preventing those who are not on the ground in Iraq (and probably them, too) from reliably assessing how the war is going. But we have won some great victories, which is important to remember when we feel the war is futile and hopeless. Saddam Hussein's horrible dictature is brought to an end. And the firm stand on Iraq has had dramatic side effects in the rest of the world. The last point is the easiest to deal with: the liberation of Iraq has been very far from futile. Since the fall of Saddam, Libya has agreed to disarm its weapons of mass destruction. Iran has admitted the International Atomic Energy Authority to survey its nuclear installations. As a by-product of this, UN inspectors in Tripoli and Tehran helped to uncover the trade in nuclear technology overseen by the Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan. If one of the most significant objectives of the Iraqi conflict was pour encourager les autres, then it has been a resounding success. However, if the coalition cuts and runs now, hardly anyone will remember these extremely important victories. There is no other outcome than a stable, democratic Iraq that is acceptable. Cutting and running will be a total disaster. Even those who argue the war in Iraq was a mistake cannot reasonably deny that it is now a crucial battle in the global war on terror. In this, if nothing else, al-Qaeda and George Bush totally agree. A withdrawal will leave al-Qaeda with a massive victory, and those who oppose the war cannot look away and said "you destroyed it, you repair it." Either Iraq will be a hard-won victory in the war on terror, bringing democracy into the heartland of the Muslim Middle East, or we are all in a much more dangerous position. 4:17:20 AM    comment []  trackback []

© Copyright 2004 Jan Haugland. Last update: 01.06.2004; 02:23:48.