Wednesday, May 20, 2009

no news is good news

Strange to me but it seems since his Inauguration, there has been little mention of Iraq, outside of the occasional statements made by Secretary Gates or the anticipated troop withdrawals Obama ran his campaign on. No more images even on the great cathode ray tube. When Bush was in office, seems that is all we read, heard and saw.

If you didn’t know, April was the deadliest month in seven months with respct to US fatalities in Iraq. In fact the civilian death toll has also been steadily increasing . On April 29, 2009 in a news conference President Barack Obama was asked if recent violence in Iraq would affect his timetable for withdrawal of U.S. troops. Strange thing was that same day three car bombs killed at least 51 people in markets in Baghdad. Although Obama answered by saying that we have not “ seen the kinds of huge spikes that you were seeing for a time” and that “the political system is holding and functioning in Iraq." True the number of deaths is not as great as it was in 2007 and 2008 the same time period, but the Iraq's government says that 435 civilians were killed in April, which means the count is likely to be greater than that reported. This by my math represents almost an 40% increase since March.

This is very disturbing because it as if since the number of deaths is lower from the past year that it makes it acceptable, putting in the context of the current President. Even stranger is that during his campaign his mantra was that “the war should have never been fought . But turned around on February 27, while addressing US troops at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina he said the US military “have fought against tyranny and disorder."

After just over 100 days in office, the current Administration is considering reversing course by leaving U.S. troops in Iraq, which makes me think , like all politicians, saying what the folks want to hear is all that count for following up on such actions are not as important as getting elected. But I understand that politics is a big old game. The real deal is that we seem not to be even able to trust our media to give us the real deal. And things may be getting just ready to hit the fan the way the Taliban is putting down and with these new images that the President has said he will not release to the public. Again I had to go to a foreign sources to see 16 of the 44 pics. But in the big picture the war, and folks dying in Iraq, political lies and the like are not as important as American Idol results, Mike Vick getting out of jail, Rihanna and Drake hooking up or Nas and his woman. So make no never mind about me. I guess no news is good news.

19 comments:

Sista GP said...

I was noticing the day about the lack of Iraqi War coverage. Now the media is on the next hot topic. They seem more like 'dem-dia'.

E.M.H. said...

Unfortunately, it's out of sight out of mind (A PHRASE THAT I've had mentioned to me a lot lately and I cannot STAND IT). If the war was happening on home soil, I guarantee the U.S would take a different attitude. They don't realize that we are still impacted by the war, despite it taking place else where.

Diva (in Demand) said...

You betta preach! We have been saying for the longest time that if the same efforts were given to REAL ISSUES that we give to celebrities and their social status...we would be the most informed nation in the world and capable of holding our elected officials responsible!

Nicki_nik said...

Torrance, once again you are on top of it dear! Not only has there hasn't been much mention of the Iraq war, but the war on terror in general. I think the focus is mostly on the domestic economic issue and how things are affecting people, here that they forget that there are innocent people getting killed by the hundreds (even thousands) on a monthly basis.

When I'm at work they have a satelite TV up in the trade room for all of the traders and all they talk about are the banks and the auto industry as if they are the only things to talk about. I hear you about reading news outside of the US, it's often refreshing to see a different perspective...

Lawgurl said...

Let the truth be told, White America isn't thinking about the war... They're all about their ca$h and since the market is all up in smoke... guess where the focus is at... Now its on torture because White America will do anything to cover up just how Barbaric they are... they don't want to admit to what happened to get African's onto the slaves ships... what happened on the slaves ships...much less what's happened once the African's got off the damn slaves ships... & for the past 300+ years... they can justify a war... but they can't justify their barbarism... so they will protect it at all cost...

I must give it to Obama... he's stopped allowing others to dictate what his agenda is going to be... now he just needs to get everyone else to believe in his agenda...

Ms. Henderson said...

WOW! You are very insightful I appreciate the knowledge! Keep it up!

Anonymous said...

Maybe since we're in a recession they didn't want to burden us with more negativity (being sarcastic).

I haven't visited your blog in a while...thanks for keeping it real..

KELSO'S NUTS said...

Life's cheaper over there. I guess Torrance didn't get the memo.

No, that's yesterday's memo. Sorry. Today's memo is "indefinite preventive detention."

My god, you folks live in a dictatorship. That is nothing short of a concentration camp at GITMO. What is everybody so paranoid about? I live in a country with no military and a de-militarized police force and a huge Muslim population, Christian population, Jewish population, indigenous Animists, and lots and lots of atheists. And nobody's worried about the "Muslims bringing in al-Qaida." Damn. Down here Jewish people and Muslims live in the same neighborhoods and quite often intermarry.

So, perpetual detention without charge or investigation of any kind is some kind of bold NEW agenda Obama was DARING enough to put into place was it? Expropriating $3.5 TRILLION from the poor, the working class, the middle-class, the smallbusinessperson and entrepreneur to give it to the ultra-rich? That's STICKING IT TO WHITE AMERICA, alright. Gee whiz, this Obama's a regular Stokely Carmichael, isn't he? He's SHOWING the WHITE MAN, alright. He's showing him where the keys to the vault are located, for fuck's sake.

But I don't know. I couldn't know. I'm White. And I'm not American anymore if I ever even was. My family's not from there originally.

There's this funny consensus we outsiders live by. The governments grant the maximum personal freedom possible and expects the maximum personal responsibility possible. That's what a free republic is all about.

Where I live they can hold you without charge if you elect not to call your attorney for 6 hours. That's it. Not for the rest of your life. 6 hours. And the only terrorism that's ever happened here was perpetrated by the US Armed Forces at El Chorillo when General Powell incinerated an entire neighborhood of civilians. 5000 dead and 100,000 homeless. In a country of 3 million. Despite that nobody's even afraid of the US anymore, but the US has been the only aggressor here.

How that man can be so cold-hearted to send the youth of America to be blown apart when he was afraid to register for the draft in 1980 is beyond me. No. It's not beyond me. It's exactly like his predecessor.

And for what it's worth, I DID register even though I didn't like it morally and I would have been very scared had I been drafted and sent to Lebanon.

KELSO'S NUTS said...

@ Law: Who do you think Obama's voters are, exactly? Whom do you think Obama's policies are geared to please? Well, his vote total among White, Middle-Class, Republican and Independent Men was larger than every other demographic combined. His policies are geared to help Wall Street, K-Street, Langley, the Pentagon, LockheedMartin, Raytheon, and GE.

I got no problem admitting that there's an ongoing holocaust against Black America that began well before the birth of the nation. That's true. Guess who's in charge and leading it now?

$350 BILLION off the top for the top 20 banks with no oversight each time. $92 BILLION every month in extra, off-the-books war allocation. How much is trickling down to your neighborhood?

It's not my problem because he's not my president. Martin Torrijos is until Ricardo Martinelli's inauguration in July. If Obama follows through on the threats he's made to the sovereignty of the nation, the RUSO-LATINO PACT allows Russia to send MIGs and Tupolevs to ward it off. So, it's all jake down here, buddy.

Jackie E. said...

I think it is important however, to give the President some leeway to change his thoughts and opinions on situations once he is fully enlightened as to the pros and cons, benefits and harmful repercussions of decisions that he previously made. Just as he did recently in deciding to oppose the release of photos showing alleged abuse of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan, citing that release would only aid al-Qaeda propaganda efforts.

There comes a time, when regardless of who might not like it or who might be offended, you have to make decisions and change decisions based on what is in the best interest of the country.

That is not to say that that is the case here, but I just feel the option should be left open for those times when such a reverse in opinion is necessary. Let's not forget that he too is human, and prone to make errors in judgment just like the rest of us but like my mother always says " when you know better, you do better".

Keli said...

The last administration wanted us to be bombarded with images of the War in Iraq...

and this administration is the complete opposite.

You are correct, politics is a game...

but who ends up the victor?

KELSO'S NUTS said...

@ JACKIE E:

I'm not offended in the slightest. He's not my president. It's not my country. When Obama threatened my country to score cheap political points back home, President Torrijos literally stared him down. President-elect Martinelli said "Que se joda," which means "he can fuck himself."

The "Americas Summit" was a nice little show but the issues go on and their all of a piece with Obama's bellicose war policy and command-and-control domestic policy.

Everybody is entitled to his or her likes and dislikes. If you like the policy, I say "great." These things do not come without costs, though. If in eight years the US is still at war, you may find an African-American on a NASA crew to Neptune before he or she is on a major party ticket and that's just the "identity" group part of it, which is interesting but meaningless.

If a recovery begins and that is a huge if, the USA is going to need vast amounts of natural resources to feed business demand. Sorry to say it but the world base metals and crude market is not controlled by the USA.

I cant think of three countries I know intimately, each of whom, vigorously oppose Obama's foreign policy of violence, threats and aggression, who have CARTEL CONTROL over the copper, aluminum, nickel, jet fuel and heating oil markets: Chile, Russia and Venezuela.

American people will believe anything. As Torrance says "Rhianna or Chris Brown or American Idol is what they care about." Chilenos, Venezolanos, and Russians -- average, middle-class, working people -- DO care about what's going on and how it affects them. They vote at 80% of eligibility. Their leaders pay attention.

So, Obama is sure free to fiddle as Rome burns. A belief in the necessity of Obama's personal growth may be a luxury your country can't afford.

You cannot "offend" Michelle Bachelet. She spent 2 1-2 years in Secretary Gates's rape rooms while Pinochet was in charge. You can, however, cause her country various problems as Obama has and her response when it can really hurt will not be "the Chilean dream," or "only in Chile." It would be for CODELCO to sever all US contracts or put to a hard quota subject to individual negotiation on US copper exports and an embargo on Microsoft and Disney (ABC) programming.

These are the issues every other country deals with on a daily basis quite apart from the USA. I think that Obama's personal growth is a wonderful thing but the outside world has already grown up. And as grown-ups, they do BUSINESS. They TRADE. That is foreign policy.

Fantasy crusades against "terror" are a little infantile for the likes of Bachelet and Medvedev.

I promise you I take no offense at anything Obama does. I'm glad he won. I absolutely barbecued the US Presidential outright futures market on the Ireland screen buying long-Obama contracts at 52c and 61c on the dollar. I feel no particular "White Pride." If I could pick one person in American politics whose views match mine the closest and whom I'd love to see as president right now, it's Barbara Lee. She's a grown-up. She's dealt with a lot of world leaders on trade before. She's for peaceful, fair, trade, open minds and open markets.

For your sake, I hope Obama grows up quick. Everybody out here is playing for keepsies. War is hardly the answer. This was what I meant when I highlighted the RUSO-LATINO pact, but it's not just Latinos. If given a choice between backing the US or NATO in WWIII, Russia's backing NATO, too. In other words, the nukes are useless because it's M.A.D. The regular military forces are useless because the day that the US makes military aggression on a major capitalist democratic first-world republic is also M.A.D.

To me, win-win, peaceful, fair trade, economic growth, and aid to nations in need should be the goal of foreign policy.

But who am I to knock torture?

2sweetnsaxy said...

Such horrible images. War is so ugly yet we sit in the lap of peace and complacency, never having to worry about bombs going off around us, never knowing much worse than our neighborhood terrorists (gangs). I don't think most Americans really want to see how horrible it is over there, just like they didn't want to see how horrible it was (and still is in some cases), for Blacks. Turn a blind eye so we can keep smiling.

They will only push the fear of what's going on over there when it will serve their purpose.

a.eye said...

I haven't been following the war news much this year. Possibly because it is not presented as much as in the past. I had no idea about these numbers.

Thanks for sharing. I will definitely be paying more attention now.

Torwch said...

Wow, just stumbled on you blog and i am IMPRESSED! i like it a lot.

On this post, most people are pretty insecure, and when they have to decide over whether to worry about themselves or a war far away, the stuff closer to home usually wins out. I live up in Canada and I can say that the same is true up here... People stop caring about the rest of the world when their own is threatened. Keep up the great posts.

-torwch: http://instantmartians.blogspot.com/

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