Wednesday, April 09, 2003

WHERE DO WE KICK ASS NEXT? First in an occasional series Much talk has gone into the possibility of fighting more wars against terror following the successful conclusion* of our wars against Afghanistan and Iraq. Neocon hawks in the Bush administration want to push the war on to Iran, Syria, and possibly Libya in an effort to remake the Middle East as a safer place for our ally, Israel. Other Americans, including Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona), have urged taking a tougher line with Kim Jong Il's Stalinist dictatorship in North Korea. As a public service, we at the Monster Limo Weblog present this series, "Where Do We Kick Ass Next?," as a way to help our leaders make the appropriate foreign policy decisions that will affect our world well into the 21st century. Especially, we hope to direct our leaders to consider the ass-whomping of countries that many Americans have heretofore considered insignificant or irrelevant to US interests. After all, as President Bush so boldly stated, if you aren't with us, you are with the terrorists. Consideration for inclusion in the list of ass-kickable countries will be based on the four categories established for the justification of war in Iraq, namely: (1) Whether or not the government of the country in question is a brutal dictatorship that oppresses its people and threatens its neighbors; (2) Whether the government or powerful interests within said country support the terrorist campaign of Al Qaeda or "Al Qaeda-type" groups; (3) Whether the government in question is developing, has developed, or could possibly one day within the realms of possibility develop weapons of mass destruction; (4) Whether anyone in the country, at any time, has ever tried to kill the President's dad. For the inaugural entry in this series, we urge President Bush, the Pentagon, the Wall Street Journal editorial board, and millions of ignorant Americans to consider the possibility of kicking TANZANIA's ass. According to Human Rights Watch, the Tanzanian security forces have been engaging in massacres of opposition demonstrators on the islands of Unguja and Pemba, from where the delightful breed of dog known as the monkey hound comes. As if this weren't bad enough, the report documents that President Benjamin Mkapa came to power in 2000 through "internationally condemned election fraud" (ahem) and has done nothing to restrain the brutality of security forces in Zanzibar (the name for the two Indian Ocean islands), who recently fired on "thousands" of civilians, provoking a refugee flood to nearby Kenya. As shown by this report, Tanzania ably fills the first condition needed for the US to consider pre-emptive assault: not only is the Butcher of Dar Es Salaam - as Mkapa will henceforth be referred to - massacring his own people, a la Saddam, he is also contributing to instability in the region by forcing refugees into Kenya. Although Tanzania does not seem to have weapons of mass destruction, and although we don't know for sure whether anyone there has planned to kill George Bush's father, the name of the capital alone should be enough to convince us of links to Muslim terrorists. To the long-suffering people of Tanzania: the brutal regime which oppresses you is on notice. Your deliverance is near. As Richard Perle might say, "Everyone wants to go to Damascus, but real men want to go to Unguja." -Consider Arms 4:34:11 PM    comment []

US tells Syria, Iran, N. Korea & Earth Crisis, "Prepare for, ALL OUT WAR!!" U.S. Undersecretary of State, John R. Bolton, today generously offered Syria and other potential WMD states in the region the "wonderful opportunity" to abandon all hope...er... illegal weapons programs. JR Bolton didn't say what might happen if this serendipitous moment was not seized upon, but I think we can all take the hint.   "I can't tell you if all 10 fingers are off the throat, but finger by finger, it's coming off" I like to imagine that Dubya has a little Saddam voodoo doll (think "My Buddy", but with a moustache and fatigues) that he throws around the oval office when he's stressed out.  Anyway, Bush has made it perfectly clear that since the UN didn't play nice with him over Iraq, their role in the IIA will be nominal at best. So much for international legitimacy.   History is written by the (arrogant) victors Pooh-pooh peaceniks and war dissenters! You said it couldn't be done and yet Operation Iraqi Freedom is rockin' like Dokken. Just ask Dick Cheney, who pulled off the contortionist feat, at the annual convention of the American Society of Newspaper Editors, of patting himself on the back for the war while jerking himself off over the revenues he just helped generate for his former employer. Note to al-Jazeera and its dead reporter: don't be an "idiot", dude.   - M.C. No Shame   4:27:58 PM    comment []

God bless the Free Press! As has been the case since the war began, press coverage of Operation Re-Elect Bush has been staggeringly, unfalteringly objective, providing in-depth and useful analysis of all aspects of the war. Earlier this week, a U.S. precision air strike hit a target in the al-Mansour district of western Baghdad where Saddam Hussein was thought to be meeting with, um, other Iraqis. (Al-Monsour has repeatedly been described as "upscale," which is a weird thing to call a neighborhood in a city under siege, after years of sanctions during this big war. Perhaps Detroit is also "upscale.") Now, I’m no marginalized retired general turned military analyst, but doesn’t it seem strange that the target of this strike was a restaurant? Didn’t Rumsfeld attempt to calm a jittery public by insisting that only military sites would be targeted? I mean, sure, it’s nothing new: the U.S.’s technique is not unlike the Israeli army’s in attempting to kill single individuals with bombs, but you’d think there’d be at least a whisper about the fact that a restaurant is by no means a military target (with the possible exception of the U.S.S. Chowderpot in Hartford, CT). Instead, the whispering is about whether we really got Saddam this time. Oh, silly CNN. Well, it looks like that parade of democracy in the streets that Condi Rice promised us so long ago is finally coming to pass. "Iraqis released decades of pent-up fury as U.S. armored forces solidified their grip on the city." What a bizarre war this has been – no Iraqi demonstrations to protest the slaughtering of the Iraqi people (Iraq Body Count has it somewhere in the one thousand civilians range, and the AP reported yesterday that estimates of Iraqi military deaths – which the U.S. is not keeping track of – may be in the tens of thousands). Slaughter, or as Steven Colbert of The Daily Show puts it, a "hellacious ass whomping." Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to step into the men’s room and release decades of pent-up fury… Moving right along to our This War Will Never End department, Rumsfeld says that – surprise, surprise – "We are getting scraps of intelligence saying that Syria has been cooperative in facilitating the move of the people out of Iraq and into Syria." I guess the administration is just too plain exhausted to spend months and months fabricating the case to the public for a war with Syria – a country they may have never heard of anyway – and will instead insist that their invasion of Syria (heretofore "West Iraq") is merely an extension of the war in Iraq. For those of you who had Iran picked for the next round in your War on Terror March Madness tourney pool, your bracket’s all fucked up. In the meantime, the country is waiting on pins and needles for the results of those tests on the drums of purported chemical weapons. I guess we’ll have to wait for the smoking gun, but the evidence thus far is overwhelming: drums marked "pesticide" found in part of an agricultural compound (Yeah, like you can grow shit in the desert. Nice try, Saddam!) which some military officials have publicly speculated could in fact be pesticide… I rest my case, Blame America Firsters. - Marcus-Marcus 3:22:17 PM    comment []

TODAY'S TOP FIVE Dropping cluster bombs of wisdom on the Baghdad of ignorance I Guess This Means the Best Governments Are Christian Governments In a recent article published in a Baptist magazine, Bush's Secretary of Education said he thought the best schools were Christian schools, and advocated teaching "Christian values" in public schools. The best part is that Secretary Paige replied to suggestions by critics that he should recant this statement with the comment, "I will offer my prayers for them." US Bombs Liberate 11 Afghan Civilians from Vale of Tears Hey, how's that war in Afghanistan coming, by the way? Good? Are we winning? Is there a golden age of democracy and prosperity yet? Hello? Is this thing on? Prepare to Hear a Lot More Talk About "The Butcher of Damascus" Than You'd Like To Yep, looks like Syria is next on the list: Witness the new claims by Messrs. Perle, Wolfowitz, and Sharon that the reason we can't find WMD in Iraq is because Saddam transferred them (along with "a significant part of his army"[!]) to Syria so the UN inspectors couldn't find them. Those low-down Syrian skunks! Why, not only should we go to war with them, but we should fight unrelated wars in Iran and Libya, just to show the evildoers who's boss! Marines, Iraqis Collaborate in Hilarious Metaphor for Entire Misguided War This thing where the Marines pulled down a statue of Saddam in Baghdad was on CNN, and it was hilarious: What happened was a crowd of Iraqis was ineptly trying to pull down this 40 foot statue of Hussein. They tried to do it with a single rope, which broke. Then they took turns hitting the massive base of the statue with a sledgehammer. Then they got bored and most of the crowd drifted away, leaving a handful of Iraqis outnumbered by members of the press looking for a trite symbolic moment. Finally some Marines came and pulled the thing down with their tank. Isn't this a perfect metaphor for this whole misadventure? The Iraqis can't do this task by themselves, so we come in and do it for them. Here Comes Operation: Hutu Freedom, Right? Uganda claims that Rwandan troops are back in Congo, in direct violation of a treaty signed last year. Could this lead to a renewal of Africa's first World War? Well, only one thing is for certain: This will be utterly and totally ignored by the vast majority of Americans, no matter what the outcome. -Consider Arms 1:33:06 PM    comment []

FRESH FROM THE WIRES FOR DAT AZZ!! No more callers please. We have a winner for "Quote of the War":  WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The White House Wednesday called the jubilant street scenes from Baghdad as "an historic moment." ''Freedom's taste is unquenchable," said White House spokesman Ari Fleischer. "You're seeing what you see in mankind everywhere, given a chance to be free.'' - M.C. No Shame 10:45:04 AM    comment []

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