Kiev Police: When Crowd Control Goes Horribly Wrong

First, the good news: The Kiev chief of police seems to realize that storming a camp of protestors doesn't make his troops look good.

Not-so-good news: folks who want Ukraine's government to sign an agreement with the European Union and hold elections got attacked by police in Kiev. That's their version. The chief of police says that the protestors started it. Maybe he's right, maybe not.

More good news: Ukraine's Viktor Yanukovych, the country's current leader, says that he's "deeply outraged" by what Kiev police did. It's probably the only sensible thing he could say at this point: but political leaders don't always act sensibly.

The War on Terror: Accepting the 21st Century, or Not

In a way, Saturday's attack has very little to do with the war on terror.

As far as I can tell, Saturday's attack by Kievan police has nothing to do with Islamic extremists, or religion of any sort.

Nobody seems to have used car bombs, yelled "down with the Great Satan America," or sent anthrax through the mail.

However, I think the incident illustrates the sort of conflict we call the war on terror.

On the one hand, we have folks who seem to like the 21st century and think their country should get involved in current international affairs.

On the other are folks who might reasonably be expected to like things pretty much the way they were in the 'good old days.'

Control and Change

For some in Ukraine, that would be before the Soviet Union unraveled in 1991; for others, before 2004. That's when reformers forced a reasonable facsimile of an honest election down the throats of Ukraine's rulers.

For folks who like the status quo, particularly those who have had unquestioned control over the lives of others, this is not a pleasant era. Change is always happening, but we're in a time of great and rapid change.

I like it this way, but as I said: many don't; and some are willing to kill, rather than give up control.

Sunday in Kiev

Folks who want change in Ukraine are planning a very large public demonstration in Kiev today. They'll probably attract more people to their demonstration, and support around the world: thanks, I strongly suspect, in large part to the daft actions of Kiev police Saturday.

In the news:

• "Ukrainian President Yanukovych 'outraged' by violence"
  BBC News (November 30, 2013)
• "Ukraine police smash pro-Europe protest, opposition to call strike"
  Richard Balmforth and Thomas Grove, Reuters (November 30, 2013)

More about Ukraine:

• Wikipedia
• CIA World Factbook

Somewhat-related posts:

• "Dozens Dead at Domodedovo - Observations and Opinions"
  (January 25, 2011)
• "Police Abuse: America isn't Russia"
  (February 19, 2010)
• "Russian Train Derailment: Sabotage on the Moscow-St. Petersburg Line"
  (November 28, 2009)
• "Russia: Ukraine Did Something Bad - Who Could Have Predicted This?"
  (October 2, 2008)
• "If You Liked Georgia, You'll Love Ukraine"
  (September 8, 2008)

U.S. Special Forces Out of Wardak Province: My Take

There are quite a few knee jerk reactions a person could make, after reading this headline and the first sentence:

"Karzai orders US special forces out of Afghan province"
BBC News (February 24, 2013)

"The Afghan president has ordered US special forces to leave Wardak province within two weeks over allegations of disappearances and torture.

"The measures were being taken due to the actions of Afghans considered to be part of US special forces, said a spokesman for Hamid Karzai.

"The strategically significant, central province of Wardak has been the recent focus of counter-insurgency operations...."

I've known folks who sincerely support some, ah, colorful views. Depending on what assumptions the individual makes, I might expect reactions like these to the Afghan president's decision:

How dare they! Don't those foreigners know that America is always right?!

It's a CIA plot.

No doubt this is yet one more manifestation of the rampant cultural insensitivity typical of the authoritarian, male-dominated, all-white American power structure.

I think there's a bit of truth to each of those caricatured attitudes: a tiny bit.

Quotations and Conspiracies

Taking those over-simplified assumptions in order:

How dare they!

I'm an American citizen, and know that America is not perfect. Being immersed in the daily blunders and brilliance of this country, we're in a better position to appreciate this than folks living elsewhere. I am convinced that America isn't the cause of the world's problems, either.

It's a CIA plot.

Not everything is a CIA plot. I like good conspiracy theories: in fiction. Assuming that unpleasantness is the result of conspiracies seems dubious, at best. In my youth, a remarkable number of Americans seemed convinced that commie plots were behind everything they didn't like. I get the impression that seeing CIA plots behind every door is more fashionable now, but it's the same attitude.

No doubt....

Like the fellow said:

"A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject."
Sir Winston Churchill, British politician (1874 - 1965), via The Quotations Page

Some folks didn't like shortcomings and outright injustices in the way American society worked, 50 years ago. I was one of them.

America has changed quite a bit in the last half-century. Some of it I think was long-overdue, some was not good. But America has changed. Some folks don't seem to have gotten the memo.

Individuals and Responsibility

"...In a hastily convened news conference, the presidential spokesman said US special forces would have to leave Wardak within the next two weeks.

" 'There are some individuals, some Afghans, who are working within these cells, within these [US] special forces groups' in Wardak province, said spokesman Aimal Faizi.

" 'But they are part of US special forces according to our sources and according to our local officials working in the province,' he said.

"These Afghan units are facing allegations of involvement torture and disappearances, says the BBC's Karen Allen in Kabul. A preliminary investigation also blamed them for beheading a university student in the province.

"Wardak is seen as a gateway for the Taliban to target Kabul, our correspondent adds...."
(BBC News)

I think what presidential spokesperson Aimal Faizi said is important: the issue is what some individuals did. These individuals seem to be Afghan citizens who were working with U.S. special forces. They may have been acting on orders, or they may have been acting as individuals. Either way, what their actions can be seen as being the responsibility of U.S. special forces, and NATO.

I'm not happy about that. At all.

Based on previous events, I'm inclined to believe the BBC's paraphrase of a United States spokesman: that we take "all allegations of misconduct seriously." I've posted about that before.

Politics

Some details, like beheading someone, seem more consistent with cultural norms of the region than American foreign policy: but I can hardly expect the Afghan president to acknowledge that, under the circumstances.

I also sympathize with Mr. Karzai, to an extent:

"...Mr Karzai gave a blunt statement for the reasons for the ban.

" 'Our forces ask for air support from foreigners and children get killed in an air strike,' he said."
(BBC News)

I grieve for the families who lost children. On the other hand, I hope that Mr. Karzai and others will remember that the folks trying to overthrow his government seem to enjoy using human shields; and that American weapons technology, like this country, is not perfect.

Related posts:

• Afghanistan
  • "War is Not Nice"
    (February 15, 2010)
  • "Afghanistan: Diplomacy, Dialog, Cultural Sensitivity, and 4,000 Marines"
    (February 12, 2010)
  • "Stephen Farrell's Rescue: 'It's Not Fair!' and Assumptions of Omnipotence"
    (September 10, 2009)
  • "NATO, America, Afghanistan, Common Sense and Congress"
    (September 5, 2009)
  • "Afghan Election: A Few Observations"
    (August 20, 2009)
• America
  • "Guatemala, Dr. John Cutler, Tuskegee, Nürnberg, and Learning"
    (October 2, 2010)
  • "A Chilly Cell, the AP, the CIA, and Emotions"
    (March 28, 2010)
  • "Abu Ghraib: Abuse and Sexual Humiliation by American Soldiers in the News Again"
    (January 25, 2009)
  • "America, Racism, and What Didn't Happen at Virginia Tech"
    (January 22, 2009)
  • "Army Report: Big Mistakes in Iraq!"
    (June 30, 2008)
    Particularly
    • Big Iraq Mistakes Report Creates Big Dilemma
    • Too Many Facts
    • "The Past is Prologue" - Learn From It!

Egypt, America, and 'Preserving Freedom'

I wasn't entirely satisfied with last month's election here in America.

Still, it could be worse.

I could be living in Egypt.¹

Morsi? Morsy?

Egypt's President is محمد مرسى عيسى العياط‎, or Mohamed Morsi Isa El-Ayyat. I've seen his name spelled Morsi and Morsy. For now, I'm using "Morsi."

My native language, English, uses the Latin alphabet, and I've discussed transliteration before. (October 22, 2011)

Moving on.

Playing the Class Card

One of the nice things about allowing folks with ability to earn more than average is that, when things get rough, you can blame them.

Someone working for Egypt's president said that "blamed a small but powerful minority for the political upheaval." (CNN)

In my 'good old days,' it was the fault of 'pinko intellectuals' or 'bloated capitalists;' now it's the 'radical religious right,' or the 'liberal elite.' Tomayto, tomahto.

Expedient, Yes: Prudent, No

I acknowledge that when a leader starts facing the consequences of some unusually clueless move, it's easy to blame 'those people over there.' Sometimes passing the buck works: but I don't think it's the best idea. Not in the long run.

I don't doubt that folks in Egypt who are professionals, entrepreneurs, or simply have access to more information than average, are the ones trying to keep their president from taking personal control of their country.

Unlike President Morsi, though: I think they're probably right.

Freedom and Stability

Maybe Egypt's president is right, and the only way to preserve freedom in Egypt is have troops arrest citizens who don't agree with the government. Maybe not.

I'm guessing "not," but I could be wrong.

"Freedom" and "stability" sound good: and can describe worthy ideals.

But "freedom" doesn't mean "free to agree with me," or shouldn't; and "stability" shouldn't mean "keeping things just the way they are," or shouldn't.

Egypt and America

Minutiae of culture and language aside: I don't think folks in Egypt and America, or anywhere else, are all that unlike. Human nature, for good or ill, is - reliable:

"Human nature will not change. In any future great national trial, compared to the men of this, we shall have as weak and as strong, as silly and as wise, as bad and as good."
(Abraham Lincoln, Response to a serenade (November 10, 1864))

That said, all countries are not alike.

Wait a few decades, and one country often won't be 'alike.'

The America I grew up in was a place where someone could still believe that an "American" was someone with a nice English name, who either had English ancestors or who was desperately trying to pass for Anglo.

That changed in the last half-century. I like the new America, for the most part, but it's driving some folks nuts.

While writing this post, I looked up Egypt and America. The countries are similar in one or two ways. Both call the head honcho a "president," and both are republics. On the other hand, nobody's likely to get Egypt and the the United States confused:

• Egypt
  • Ethnic groups (2006 census)
    • Egyptian 99.6%
    • Other 0.4%
  • Language
    • Arabic (official)
    • English and French widely understood by educated classes
  • Religion
    • Muslim (mostly Sunni) 90%
    • Coptic 9%
    • Other Christian 1%
  • Government
    • Republic
  ("Egypt," World Factbook, CIA (page last updated November 14, 2012))
• United States
  • Ethnic groups
    • White 79.96%
    • Black 12.85%
    • Asian 4.43%
    • Amerindian and Alaska native 0.97%
    • Native Hawaiian and other Pacific islander 0.18%
    • Two or more races 1.61% (July 2007 estimate)
    • Hispanic
      • Note: a separate listing for Hispanic is not included because the US Census Bureau considers Hispanic to mean persons of Spanish/Hispanic/Latino origin including those of Mexican, Cuban, Puerto Rican, Dominican Republic, Spanish, and Central or South American origin living in the US who may be of any race or ethnic group (white, black, Asian, etc.)
  • Language (2000 census)
    • English 82.1%
    • Spanish 10.7%
    • Other Indo-European 3.8%
    • Asian and Pacific island 2.7%
    • Other 0.7%
    • note: Hawaiian is an official language in the state of Hawaii
  • Religion (2007 est.)
    • Protestant 51.3%
    • Roman Catholic 23.9%
    • Mormon 1.7%
    • Other Christian 1.6%
    • Jewish 1.7%
    • Buddhist 0.7%
    • Muslim 0.6%
    • Other or unspecified 2.5%
    • Unaffiliated 12.1%, none 4%
  • Government
    • Constitution-based federal republic
      • Strong democratic tradition
  ("United States," World Factbook, CIA (page last updated November 28, 2012))

With so many flavors of "American," I think it's getting increasingly difficult to appeal to knee-jerk paranoia in the 'average American." That doesn't keep my country's alleged best and brightest from trying, though: and that's another topic.

Related posts:

• Egypt
  • "Business (not) as Usual in Egypt"
    (December 9, 2012)
  • "Egypt, Morsi, and Dealing With Change"
    (December 4, 2012)
  • "Egypt, America: Change, Freedom, and Other Threats to the Status Quo"
    (November 23, 2012)
  • "Egypt: NGO Raids, Police, and Office Equipment"
    (December 30, 2011)
  • "Incinerated Church, Dead Christians: But it Could be Worse"
    (May 10, 2011)
• Fredom
  • "Freedom for 'People of Any Faith or No Faith At All'"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (November 9, 2012)
  • "Freedom, Fear, and the Internet"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (September 28, 2012)
  • "Tolerance, Change, America, and the World"
    (March 22, 2012)
  • "Freedom of Speech: Bothersome, but Valuable"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (January 27, 2012)
  • "Religious Freedom, Niemöller, and Muslims in America"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (April 7, 2011)
  • "DC Gun Ban, Online Censorship, Individual Rights, and Power to the People"
    (June 27, 2008)

In the news

• "Egypt crisis: Morsi gives army arrest powers before vote"
  (December ,10 2012)
• "Egypt crisis: Morsi gives army arrest powers before vote"
  (December ,10 2012)
• "Egypt's opposition rejects constitutional referendum"
  Reuters (December 9, 2012)

---

¹ From the news:

"Egypt crisis: Morsi gives army arrest powers before vote"
(December ,10 2012)

"Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi has ordered the military to maintain security and protect state institutions in the run-up to a controversial referendum on a new constitution.

"The army has also been given the power to arrest civilians.

"Mr Morsi has tried to calm public anger by annulling a decree giving him huge powers, but rejected a call to scrap the 15 December constitutional vote.

"Opposition leaders called for protests on Tuesday against the referendum.

"The opposition was "not aiming at toppling the president" but wanted a better constitution, former Foreign Minister Amr Moussa told the BBC.

"Islamist groups have said they will hold counter demonstrations, raising fears of further bloody clashes on the streets of the Egyptian capital.

"In another apparent concession, the president suspended a big tax increase on the sale of a variety of goods including soft drinks, cigarettes and beer...."

---

"Top Morsy aide: Small, powerful minority behind Egypt's political upheaval"
Reza Sayah and Amir Ahmed, CNN (December 10, 2012)

"A top aide to Egyptian President Mohamed Morsy blamed a small but powerful minority for the political upheaval that has plagued the country ahead of a planned constitutional referendum.

"The statements are the latest in a volley of accusations between Morsy's supporters and opponents, and they highlight a political crisis that at times has spilled into the streets, prompting the president to deploy troops and tanks to protect government buildings.

" 'You have the majority of the poor people, the simple, definitely for the president and for the constitution,' Muhammad Rifaa al-Tahtawi, Morsy's chief of staff, told CNN on Sunday.

" 'You have a majority among the elite who are not for this constitution. Businessmen, media people. They are definitely a small minority, but powerful minority.'..."

---

"Egypt's opposition rejects constitutional referendum"
Reuters (December 9, 2012)

"Egypt's main opposition coalition rejected on Sunday Islamist President Mohamed Mursi's plan for a constitutional referendum this week, saying it risked dragging the country into 'violent confrontation'.

"Mursi's decision on Saturday to retract a decree awarding himself wide powers failed to placate opponents who accused him of plunging Egypt deeper into crisis by refusing to postpone the vote on a constitution shaped by Islamists.

" 'We are against this process from start to finish,' Hussein Abdel Ghani, spokesman of the National Salvation Front, told a news conference, calling for more street protests on Tuesday.

"The Front's main leaders - Nobel peace laureate Mohamed ElBaradei, former Foreign Minister Amr Moussa and leftist Hamdeen Sabahy - did not attend the event...."

Business (not) as Usual in Egypt

Egypt hasn't been "stable" since around February of 2011, when quit a few folks in the Middle East decided that they were fed up with stability. I can't say that I blame them:

• "January 23, 2011 Tunisia, Twitter, Change, and Staying Sane"
  (January 23, 2011)
• "Saudi Arabia and Propping Up Mubarak"
  (February 10, 2011)
• "Divisiveness, Cultural Chaos, and the Monkey's Paw"
  (January 30, 2011)
• "What is an Information Gatekeeper?"
  (August 14, 2009)
  Particularly
  • Cultural Chaos! Divisiveness! I Like It!

The new(ish) Egyptian president seems to be trying to return the sort of stability Mubarak enjoyed. Some folks in Egypt may have thought it was a good idea. Quite a few didn't. (November 23, 2012)

So far, several Egyptians have been killed, President Morsi either left his office in a hurry, or he didn't, and Egypt is missing a political party headquarters.

One more thing, President Morsi changed his mind about stability. Sort of. Maybe.

"Safeguarding the Revolution"

"Egypt crisis: President Morsi annuls decree"
BBC News (December 9, 2012)

"Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi has annulled a decree he issued last month that hugely expanded his powers and sparked angry protests, officials say.

"However, a news conference in Cairo was told that a controversial referendum on a draft constitution would still go ahead as planned on 15 December.

"Mr Morsi's critics have accused him of acting like a dictator, but he says he is safeguarding the revolution...."

I take what I read in the news with a grain of salt: or two; or an entire salt lick. When someone's political opponents or "critics" say that an official is acting like a dictator, all I can be sure of is that they don't like what the official is doing.

In Mr. Morsi's case, though, there seemed to be more than 'politics as usual' going on. His new rules:

• Keep judges from
  • Reviewing Mr. Morsi's decisions
  • Interfering with a committee that Mr. Morsi's party is running
• Say that only Mr. Morsi can change the rules

Maybe President Morsi really is "safeguarding the revolution." I think it's reasonable, though, to wonder whose revolution is being safeguarded.

"Not Legally Possible?" Maybe

"...'The constitutional decree is annulled from this moment,' said Selim al-Awa, an Islamist politician acting as a spokesman for a meeting Mr Morsi held with political and public figures on Saturday.

"But he said the referendum on a new constitution would go ahead because it was not legally possible for the president to postpone it.

"The meeting had been boycotted by the main opposition leaders who had earlier called for their supporters to step up their protests.

"They want both the decree and the referendum cancelled...."
(BBC News)

My hat's off to the current Egyptian administration, if they're really going ahead with a dubious referendum because Egyptian law says they have to. I think some laws are stupid: but I also think that stupid laws should be changed, not ignored.

In some ways, I'm more concerned about folks who think it's okay for leaders to break the law, than I am about other folks who think it's okay to fly airliners into office buildings. It's not much of a choice: but at least the suicide pilots are generally an external threat.

"Reactionary Figures," Protests, and an Incendiary Statement

"...The president's supporters say the judiciary is made up of reactionary figures from the old regime of strongman Hosni Mubarak.

"But his opponents have mounted almost continuous protests since the decree was passed.

"They are also furious over the drafting of the new constitution because they see the process as being dominated by Mr Morsi's Islamist allies.

"Several people have been killed in the recent spate of anti-government protests, and the presidential palace has come under attack.

"The Cairo headquarters of the Muslim Brotherhood, the movement to which Mr Morsi belongs, were set on fire."
(BBC News)

I don't think the Muslim Brotherhood are 'good guys.' I don't think they're 'bad guys,' either.

I'm dubious about folks who act as if they think God follows their policies and preferences: and folks like that aren't always 'those people over there.'

When I was growing up, some radio preachers seemed to think that Jesus was an American, and that's not quite another topic.

I do think that Egyptians are no more uniform in their views and beliefs, than Americans. Dead Egyptians, arson with a political target, and continued protests seem to back up that view.

As for those "reactionary figures?" Maybe Mubarak's old pals really are behind at least some of the trouble in Egypt. Or maybe not.

Blaming a hated, and comfortably distant, foe is an old trick. America's old establishment had the communist threat, today's lot have vast right-wing conspiracies, and that's yet another topic.

Related posts:

• Freedom
  • "Egypt, Morsi, and Dealing With Change"
    (December 4, 2012)
  • "Egypt, America: Change, Freedom, and Other Threats to the Status Quo"
    (November 23, 2012)
  • "Freedom for 'People of Any Faith or No Faith At All' "
    A Catholic Citizen in America (November 9, 2012)
  • "Supporting Freedom, and Other Subversive Activity"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (June 22, 2012)
  • "Dead Syrians, Stability, and Getting a Grip"
    (June 9, 2012)
• Assumptions
  • "Tennessee Mosque, Fundamental Rights, and a Mission to Mars"
    (July 20, 2012)
    Particularly
    • 'My End of the Boat Isn't Sinking?'
  • "Murder at a Sikh Temple: Why I Care"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (August 9, 2012)
  • "Religious Freedom, Niemöller, and Muslims in America"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (April 7, 2011)
    Particularly
    • Why the Rights of Muslims Matter to This Catholic
  • "Commie Plots, Cholesterol, Frank Burns, Hugo Chavez, and 2012"
    (November 15, 2009)
  • "Guinea, Military Rule, and Terrorism: Beware Hasty Judgment"
    (December 29, 2008)

Egypt, America: Change, Freedom, and Other Threats to the Status Quo

Egypt's president says:

• He's making Egypt
  • Safe for freedom and democracy
  • Stable
• Nobody can change the new rules
  • Except him

That's a simplified version of what I found in the news.¹

Most of the new Egyptian decree sounds okay: being safe is nice; folks seem to like freedom; and democracy is supposed to be a good idea, too. I think part of the trouble folks have is that the president says that nobody can change the new rules, except him.

I can see their point: but not because President Mursi is an "Islamist."

'Free to Agree With Me?'

Freedom doesn't, or shouldn't, mean "free to agree with the boss," or "free to support 'proper' opinions." Like I've said before, I remember the trailing edge of McCarthyism, and endured political correctness while doing time in American academia.

Although their vocabulary was different, supporters of both said they were defending freedom. I think they believed it; and probably couldn't understand that another person might disagree without being pinko, homophobic, or whatever.

What 'Everybody Knows, That Just Ain't So'

Today's 'real Americans,' and those who graduated from campus activism to successful career tracks, have an odd sort of common belief: Muslims are evil, or at least dupes of Islam. An oversimplification? Yes: but I think it's good enough for a quick sketch of the attitude toward 'those people.'

What sets today's establishment apart is that all religion is supposed to be dangerous, or at least 'intolerant.'

"The establishment" isn't what it used to be, and that's almost another topic:

• "What's With 'the Establishment' in this Blog?"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (September 15, 2011)

As the name of that blog suggests, I'm one of 'those religious people.' Worse, I'm a Catholic: which doesn't mean what you may have heard.

By the way, I discuss political issues, but this isn't a "political" post, and there's a reason why it's hard to pigeonhole my views as liberal or conservative:

• "Conservative? Liberal? Democrat? Republican?
  No, I'm Catholic"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (November 3, 2008)

I'm getting seriously off-topic. Sort of.

'Kill a Commie for Christ,' and Assumptions

Let's say that the more violent iterations of the Ku Klux Klan were the only sort of 'Christianity' a person heard about. Assuming that folks who 'protected' their America from foreigners, blacks, and other 'anti-Christian' influences, were typical Christians wouldn't be hard.

Equally rabid patriots who inspired the 'kill a commie for Christ' slogan didn't help, in my opinion.

My reaction to ranting radio preachers and their secular counterparts eventually led to my becoming a Catholic, and that's definitely another topic.

Beware Rabid 'Defenders'

In a way, I'm not half as concerned about foreign threats, as I am about some of the folks determined to 'protect' my country.

These days, I don't see a 'vast right-wing conspiracy' as a serious threat to America's freedom. Too many folks remember various red scares, or were told about them in the government schools. Yet another topic.²

I am concerned about folks who apparently want to 'protect' America from the supposed dangers of religious belief: any religious belief.

That's another over-simplification. I've written about tolerance, real and imagined, fairly often: and put links under "Tolerance," below.

Egypt and a Changing World

Maybe the Egyptian president really will bring freedom, democracy, and stability, to Egypt: and then let someone else have a say in how his country is managed. I'm dubious about that: but it's possible.

I think it's more likely that Mr. Morsi wants Egypt to be a nice, orderly, "stable" country: like North Korea, Burma/Myanmar; and 20th century Latin American rulers whose title was "president," since American support depended on a show of "democracy." Cynical? Maybe.

I don't mind stability, or freedom. But I think there are different sorts of "stability:"

• Good news
• Choosing leaders without bloodshed
• Citizens living without fear of criminals in the
  • Private sector
  • Government
• Bad news
  • Protecting folks with power
    • Political
    • Military
    • Economic
  • Silencing criticism
  • Preventing change

I realize that change is unsettling, sometimes painful. But change happens, change can be good, and resisting change can create new problems: and even more unsettling, painful change. My opinion.

Getting a grip about:

• Change
  • "Egypt: NGO Raids, Police, and Office Equipment"
    (December 30, 2011)
  • "Incinerated Church, Dead Christians: But it Could be Worse"
    (May 10, 2011)
  • "Beer, Basketball, the War on Terror, Today's News, and Me"
    (March 10, 2011)
  • "Egypt, Iran: It Can't Happen Here?"
    (February 10, 2011)
    Particularly
    • 'Stability' isn't Everything
    • The Best Form of Government - is One that Works
    • Hello, Information Age: Goodbye 'Orderly' Countries
  • "Saudi Arabia and Propping Up Mubarak"
    (February 10, 2011)
• Freedom
  • Tolerance, Change, America, and the World"
    (March 22, 2012)
  • "Freedom of Speech: Bothersome, but Valuable"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (January 27, 2012)
    Particularly
    • McCarthyism, Political Correctness, and Deposed Autocrats
    • It's Different, When You're In Charge
  • "Zimbabwe, Where Watching the Wrong Videos is Treason"
    (February 25, 2011)
  • "What is an Information Gatekeeper?"
    (August 14, 2009)
    Particularly
    • Broadcast News: More of the Same
    • Cultural Chaos! Divisiveness! I Like It!
  • "DC Gun Ban, Online Censorship, Individual Rights, and Power to the People"
    (June 27, 2008)
    Particularly
    • Individual Freedom: a Treasure
    • Computers and the Internet: Now Anybody can Publish and be Heard
    • Knowledge is Power: and I Like Power
• Hate
  • "Love, Hate, and Leaving an Impression"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (November 21, 2012)
  • "Chauvinism Knows No Borders"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (July 23, 2011)
    Particularly
    • Those Nasty People Who Aren't Us?
    • The West, Christians, and Assumptions
  • "Anti-Islam Porno Posters in St. Cloud, Minnesota: 'Unacceptable' "
    (December 11, 2009)
    Particularly
    • What's an American Doing, Defending Foreigners?
    • Some of 'Those People' are My Cousins, Nieces, and Nephews
  • "Hating People? Not an Option"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (December 9, 2010)
    Particularly
    • Emotions: It's Simple, and Not-So-Simple
    • "Loving," Like "Tolerant," Means Different Things
  • "Gimme Peace, or I'll Punch Your Kid"
    (April 25, 2008)
• Tolerance
  • "Freedom for 'People of Any Faith or No Faith At All' "
    A Catholic Citizen in America (November 9, 2012)
    Particularly
    • Freedom, Citizenship, and All That
  • "Wisconsin: Dead Sikhs; Disrupted Lives"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (August 5, 2012)
    Particularly
    • Murder, Faith, and Freedom
  • "Norway: Oslo, the Island of Utoya, Dead Bodies, Bad Motives"
    (July 24, 2011)
    Particularly
    • A World Where Everyone Looks Like Me?!
    • 'My End of the Boat's Not Sinking?'
  • "The Establishment Clause; Religious Freedom; and Getting a Grip"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (October 5, 2011)
  • "Religious Freedom, Niemöller, and Muslims in America"
    A Catholic Citizen in America (April 7, 2011)
    Particularly
    • Why the Rights of Muslims Matter to This Catholic

In the news:

• "Egypt President Mursi defends new powers amid protests"
  BBC News (23 November 2012)
• "Egypt's President Expands His Own Powers"
  Sam Dagher in Cairo and Jay Solomon in Washington, The Wall Street Journal (November 22, 2012)

---

¹From the news:

"Egypt President Mursi defends new powers amid protests"
BBC News (23 November 2012)

"President Mohammed Mursi has appeared before supporters in Cairo to defend a new decree that grants him sweeping powers.

"He told them he was leading Egypt on a path to 'freedom and democracy' and was the guardian of stability.

"He was speaking as thousands of opponents gathered in Cairo's Tahrir Square and offices of the president's party were attacked in several cities.

"The decree says presidential decisions cannot be revoked by any authority...."

---

"Egypt's President Expands His Own Powers"
Sam Dagher in Cairo and Jay Solomon in Washington, The Wall Street Journal (November 22, 2012)

"Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, coming off a heady week of high-stakes diplomacy that thrust his government onto the international stage, pushed to consolidate his power at home with a set of decrees aimed at sidelining a judiciary that has been one of the last institutions challenging the Islamist government.

"The declarations, which appeared to stun the Obama administration, brought into the open a long-simmering confrontation between Mr. Morsi's Islamist government and a judiciary that is populated with many secular-leaning judges appointed by the former regime of Hosni Mubarak.

"U.S. officials on Thursday said there was no indication that Mr. Morsi was going to make this move when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Cairo Wednesday, and the administration widely praised the Egyptian president for brokering the cease-fire between the militant group Hamas and Israel that also involved the U.S. and a host of regional powers. The agreement ended more than a week of Hamas rocket attacks on Israel and repeated bombardment of Gaza by the Israeli military.

"A senior U.S. State Department official said Mr. Morsi's actions 'have raised some concerns' and that officials are watching the developments closely....

"...The set of decrees exempt the president's decisions from all judicial review and bars the courts from dissolving a constitutional-drafting committee that has increasingly come under the sway of Mr. Morsi's allies in the Muslim Brotherhood.

"Several prominent Egyptian liberal political leaders, including some who ran in this year's presidential election, met in Cairo on Thursday, with most expressing their shock at Mr. Morsi's moves.

" 'Morsi today usurped all state powers and appointed himself Egypt's new pharaoh. A major blow to the revolution that could have dire consequences,' wrote Mohammed ElBaradei, a former candidate and former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, on his official Twitter account.

"The negotiations over Gaza, whose conclusion was announced by Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohammed Kamel Amr with Mrs. Clinton at his side, elicited praise for Egypt's new leader, who came to power this year in the wake of the revolution that overthrew Mr. Mubarak. The Obama administration talked with cautious optimism of teaming up with Mr. Morsi to attempt to make progress on regional issues that have been stalled for decades....

"...U.S. officials have urged Mr. Morsi to pursue changes that include gender and religious rights in Egypt. 'We encourage all parties to work together and we call for Egyptian leaders to resolve these issues through democratic dialogue,' the official said....

"...While the immediate impact of the declarations remains unclear, observers said they could help further strengthen the Muslim Brotherhood's dominance of the constitutional-drafting process and perhaps open the door to retrials of former regime officials and connected businessmen who were found not guilty in corruption trials.

"Mr. Morsi's allies defended the decrees as necessary to prevent former regime influence from derailing an increasingly turbulent transition.

"They insisted that the extraordinary powers bestowed by the decrees will disappear once a new constitution is drafted and goes into effect....

"Yet the declarations also sealed Mr. Morsi's position as the dominant figure over Egypt's transition to a system many hope will be more democratic—and raised new concerns that Mr. Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood are eliminating all checks on their authority...."

---

² Some Americans who home school their kids may be intellectually-challenged sociopaths with strong anti-science beliefs. I think that stereotype is seriously flawed, but what would I know? I'm one of those home-schooling parents: and 'everybody knows' what they're like.

I've harangued about education, science, and religion, a bit in another blog:

• "Recovering from a Hurricane; Defending Freedom; Studying the Cosmos"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (November 22, 2012)
  Particularly
  • 'Super-Jupiter' Photographed: Kappa Andromedae b
  • Of Points and People
• "Coney Island School, 'Offensive' Song, and 'Foreigners' "
  A Catholic Citizen in America (June 10, 2012)
• "Time, the Universe, and Space Aliens"
  Apathetic Lemming of the North (April 20, 2012)
  Particularly
  • Space Aliens and the Universe
• Sex, Science, and the Home Schooling Parent"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (September 17, 2011)
• "Home Schooling, Religious and Moral Instruction, and American Culture"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (March 6, 2010)

America is Not at War With the Marines

On the whole, I like living in America. I also think this country has a political system that's not the worst ever devised by humanity.

Which isn't quite the same as thinking that democracy always produces desirable results - and that other forms of government are always bad:

• "Guinea, Military Rule, and Terrorism: Beware Hasty Judgment"
  (December 29, 2008)

On a related topic, Americans have a presidential election coming up this November. I plan to vote. This time around, I think it's particularly important: because apparently the lunatics are running this particular asylum.

An Apparent Attack, and Disarming Those Big, Rough, Marines

The good news is that Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is okay. The bad news is that, if an apparent attack had been a little better planned - some obliging soul had seen to it that all the big, rough, dangerous United States Marines in Mr. Panetta's vicinity - - - had been disarmed.

I - am - not - making - this - up.

"Military source calls incident at Afghanistan airport an 'attempted attack' "
FoxNews.com (March 14, 2012)

"A military source tells Fox News the strange incident on the tarmac Wednesday at Camp Bastion that occurred moments before Defense Secretary Leon Panetta arrived via C-17 was an attempted attack.

"This official could not say whether the local Afghan involved knew Panetta was about to arrive, but he could say it certainly wasn't any type of accident.

"Fox News has learned the attacker was an Afghan interpreter who was carrying gasoline and a lighter with him in the pickup truck, which he managed to steal from a British service member. The coalition service member was injured during the incident, possibly run over by the truck...."

That article is about the apparent attack.

This is why I think Mr. Panetta was very, very lucky:

"Soldiers asked to disarm during Leon Panetta speech"
The Telegraph (March 15, 2012)(not a typo: it's 'tomorrow' on the other side of the Atlantic now)

"US soldiers were asked to disarm during a speech by Leon Panetta, the American defence secretary, in a sign of grown concern over spates of seemingly random violence in Afghanistan.

"Less than a week after a US staff sergeant allegedly massacred 16 civilians in Kandahar, American soldiers were banned from bringing guns into a talk by Mr Panetta at a base in Helmand province.

"Around 200 troops who had gathered in a tent at Camp Leatherneck were told 'something had come to light' and asked abruptly to file outside and lay down their automatic rifles and 9mm pistols.

" 'Somebody got itchy, that's all I've got to say. Somebody got itchy - we just adjust,' said the sergeant who was told to clear the hall of weapons.

"Major General Mark Gurganus later said he gave the order because Afghan troops attending the talk were unarmed and he wanted the policy to be consistent for all....."

I don't blame General Gurganus. Like anyone else in the United States Armed forces, the hierarchy he's in has a civilian at the top. There may even have been a rational motive for 'consistently' disarming everybody around Mr. Panetta.

With the possible exception of anyone who might want to hurt the American official: and wasn't as dedicated to following the rules as Marines are.

Someone really ought to tell the lot that's running America just now: We're NOT AT WAR WITH THE UNITED STATES MARINES. The American military is not, except in the minds of some politically-correct diehards from the '60s, the enemy.

A tip of the hat to @darsen003, on Twitter, for the heads-up on the Telegraph article.

Somewhat-related posts:

• "Noted: New York State Education Department: 'The Military ... Doesn't Count' "
  (March 4, 2012)
• "New York City's Times Square, a Smoking SUV, and Decisions"
  (May 1, 2010)
• "Someone Should Tell Congress There's a War on: President Obama, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab"
  (February 3, 2010)
• "Nidal Malik Hasan: 'We've Got to Promote Him'?"
  (January 11, 2010)
• "Air Force One Attacks New York City: City Passes Air Raid Drill"
  (April 27, 2009)

Egypt: NGO Raids, Police, and Office Equipment

I'm still cautiously optimistic about "Arab spring."

What we've seen so far is more about upsetting the apple cart, than building new and better governments. Durable autocracies in Libya, Tunisia, and Egypt, are gone. Syria's boss got dropped from the Arab League. Bahrain's king may be learning that killing his subjects isn't a good idea.

That's cautiously optimistic.

Years, Decades, Generations

There's a chance that at least some of the countries where folks ousted an autocrat will have trouble for years. Maybe decades. Some may even elect a home-grown equivalent of Iran's ayatollahs.

But I think that enough folks in places like Egypt and Libya have gotten a taste of freedom: and liked it. They've also learned how to use the Internet and other Information Age technologies and social structures: and are catching up on what's happened in the last few thousand years. Particularly since the 18th century.

In the long run, generations from now, I think there's a good chance that folks in the Middle East will develop governments that serve the citizens: not just the local gentry.

Meanwhile, it's rough going.

'Because We Can?'

Egypt's old-school autocrat, Mubarak, is out. Right now, Egypt has a military government. That, by itself, isn't bad news: not in my opinion, anyway.

Raids on Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs): that's bad news.¹

At least two of the NGOs have been observing Egypt's elections. They "...may have received illegal foreign funding and have been operating without licenses from the Foreign Ministry and local ministries...." (CNN) 'Obviously' they're foreign spies?!

Actually, it's anyone's guess why Egyptian police took stuff from these outfits.

Maybe it's just because they have the power to do so: and like to flex their muscles. Or maybe not.

'Commies,' 'Hate Speech,' and Stolen Office Equipment

An op-ed in the United Kingdom² said that it's probably because Egypt's current bosses don't like it when folks act on their own volition. He may be right about that.

I remember the 'good old days,' when 'regular Americans' had conniptions when commies and pinkos disagreed with them. More recently, defenders of 'tolerance' have labeled opposing views as "hate speech." Tomayto, tomahto.

A partial list of what got stolen confiscated may suggest another motive:

"...Police took laptops, desktops, video conferencing equipment, cell phones and other electronics, Hughes said. They also took between 15 and 20 boxes of documents...."
(CNN)

Here in America, that's several thousand dollars' worth of merchandise. I don't have too much trouble imaging that an enterprising, and ethically-challenged, enforcer might decide to supplement his income with a little informal taxation.

However, I think the UK op-ed author has a very plausible explanation. I think I can understand why Egypt's current bosses want to control what others say, and how they say it. But that doesn't mean I think it's a good idea.

Related posts:

• Freedom, more or less
  • "SOPA, Censorship, the Twits in Washington, and a Ranting Lemming"
    Apathetic Lemming of the North (December 28, 2011)
  • "Not-So-Good News from Iraq: Arrest Warrant; Debatable Confessions, and Politics"
    (December 19, 2011)
  • "Freedom, Even For 'Those People Over There' "
    (November 11, 2011)
  • "Still Blogging About Anachronisms, Autocrats, and America"
    (October 8, 2011)
  • "Banning Online Terrorist Recruiters? Be Careful About What You Wish For"
    (March 10, 2009)
  Anachronisms meet the Information Age
  • "Libya's Qadhafi, Qaddafi, Kadafi, or Gaddafi, is Dead: Now What?"
    (October 22, 2011)
  • "France and Online Social Media: Dealing With E-Mail and Other Threats"
    (June 6, 2011)
  • "Libya, Syria, Bahrain: Journalists Uncooperative; 'the Masses' Worse"
    (March 29, 2011)
  • "Bahrain, Foreign Troops, and - Maybe - the Last Stand of Kings"
    (March 18, 2011)
  • "Tunisia, Twitter, Change, and Staying Sane"
    (January 23, 2011)

---

¹ News and views:

"NGOs puzzled by Egyptian raids"
CNN (December 30, 2011)

"A day after Egyptian police raided the offices of 10 nongovernmental organizations across the country, the groups remained in the dark about what the authorities were looking for.

" 'We asked them if there was something specific we could help them find,' Julie Hughes, Egypt country director for the National Democratic Institute (NDI), told CNN Friday. 'They refused to answer.'

"Two other U.S.-based agencies, Freedom House and the International Republican Institute (IRI), were also raided.

"Police took laptops, desktops, video conferencing equipment, cell phones and other electronics, Hughes said. They also took between 15 and 20 boxes of documents.

"The actions were part of an investigation into allegations that groups may have received illegal foreign funding and have been operating without licenses from the Foreign Ministry and local ministries, according to Adel Saeed, spokesman for the general prosecutor's office...."

---

"Egypt rights groups blast raids on NGO offices"
AP, via CBS News (December 30, 2011)

"Several Egyptian rights groups on Friday accused the country's ruling military council of using 'repressive tools' of the deposed regime in waging an 'unprecedented campaign' against pro-democracy organizations.

"The groups' joint statement came just hours after security forces stormed offices of 10 rights organizations, including several based in the United States. The Interior Ministry said the raids were part of the investigation into foreign funding of rights groups.

"The military, which took over control after a popular uprising toppled longtime President Hosni Mubarak in February, has often accused the groups of promoting protests with the help of funds from abroad...."

² Op-ed about Egypt's police raids:

"Egypt's raids on NGOs are about control"
Brian Whitaker, guardian.co.uk (December 30, 2011)
"Restricting NGO funding is typical of authoritarian regimes happy to take foreign aid but less happy about human rights

"Imagine you live in Saudi Arabia and want to start a discussion group with some friends. The only way to do it legally is to ask the king's permission.

"Musa al-Qarni dutifully wrote a letter to the king but never got a reply – so he went ahead anyway. A few months later, Qarni was arrested and carted off to jail after secret police commandos stormed the villa in Jeddah where he and several men 'widely known for their advocacy on issues of social and political reform' were meeting.

"In most Arab states any sort of civil society organisation, even something as innocent as a youth group or stamp-collecting club, has to be registered with the authorities, and if the authorities don't like the sound of it they may refuse or simply ignore the request, leaving the applicants in a legal limbo.

"In Bahrain and Oman they can refuse permission on the grounds that the organisation is unnecessary or, in Oman's case, 'for any other reasons' decided upon by the ministry of social affairs. In Qatar, if a society wants to admit non-Qatari members it must ask the prime minister first...."

---

Not-So-Good News from Iraq: Arrest Warrant; Debatable Confessions, and Politics

American troops are moving out of Iraq. Which may or may not be something that the current administration will want folks to remember next November.

I'd be a whole lot more happy to see Iraq's new lot of leaders pass another milestone, if it weren't for something I read in today's news.

By the way, I've noticed a change in news coverage over the last several years. Maybe I'm kidding myself, but reporters and editors seem to have finally realized that The Masses aren't quite the gullible ignoramuses - - - and I'll get back to that.

On a more immediate and serious note, Iraq's politics are in the news again:

"Arrest warrant issued for Iraqi vice president"
Joamana Karadsheh, CNN (December 19, 2011)

"An Iraqi investigative committee issued an arrest warrant Monday for Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi, who is accused of orchestrating bombing attacks.

"The committee of five judges issued the warrant under Article 4 of the country's anti-terrorism law.

"The Interior Ministry, at a news conference, showed what it called confession videos from people identified as security guards for al-Hashimi, the country's Sunni vice president. In the videos, the men described various occasions in which they purportedly carried out attacks under direct orders from al-Hashimi...."

Bombs, Videos, and News

Iraq's Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi may be guilty of ordering terrorist attacks on people in his own country. Or not.

I really don't know.

What I'm fairly certain about is:

• Bombs went off in Iraq
  • And people died
• Someone made videos, purportedly
  • Featuring men who
    • Worked for the Vice President
    • Confessed to serious crimes
    • Said the Vice President was the mastermind

The videos are real enough. CNN says they've been shown at a news conference, and I'm inclined to believe that assertion.

Bombings in Iraq have been in the news. People have reportedly died. Again, I'm inclined to believe the assertions.

Confessions, Coercion, and Removing the Opposition

As for whether the new videos are an example of convincing acting, coerced confessions, or something else? Back to that CNN article:

"...One man said he carried out assassination attempts using roadside bombs and guns with silencers. He said some orders came from the vice president and some came through the director of his office. The man also alleged that he and others were told that if they didn't carry out the attacks, their families would be killed.

"CNN could not immediately confirm that the men in the videos were bodyguards for al-Hashimi...."
(CNN)

Hats off to CNN: like quite a few other mainstream news outlets, they're apparently learning that

• Being told something is true doesn't mean that it really happened
• It's a good idea to let readers know what is
  • An unsubstantiated claim
  • An assertion that someone verified

Like I said before, I don't know whether the Iraqi Vice President is guilty or not. I do think these confessions popped up at a very convenient time for folks who plausibly might want Tariq al-Hashimi out of the way. If al-Hashimi is captured by his political enemies, I hope that he doesn't 'commit suicide.' Or simply disappear.

Iraq, Politics, and All That

I'll say this for the last few American elections: nobody's tried to finger a major candidate for personally ordering a hit. In a way, that's a tribute to the moral fiber of America's political community.

There's another election coming up, and I hope that American politicos continue to limit themselves to weirdly emotional appeals; mudslinging, ballot box stuffing, and crackpot legal shenanigans when they lose, anyway.

On the whole, I'd rather live in America than anywhere else in the world: but perfect this country isn't.

Getting back to Iraq, CNN, and what could be a really messy situation:

"...Three of the vice president's security guards were detained earlier this month.

"Over the past few days, [Iraqi Vice President] al-Hashimi's office told CNN it feared that his three guards would be forced to make false confessions.

"Confession videos in Iraq have been controversial. Human rights groups have reported previously on allegedly forced confessions...."
(CNN)

If al-Hashimi has been arranging premature deaths for personal gain, what his office said might be an effort to reduce damage from anticipated confessions.

Or, al-Hashimi's staff may have been genuinely - and legitimately - concerned for the welfare of the guards.

Confession? Yeah: Me an' the Boys'll Get a Confession For Ya

"...Ali al-Mussawi, media adviser to Shiite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, said over the weekend that confessions would link the Sunni vice president to bombings...."
(CNN)

Maybe the Iraqi Prime Minister's media chap simply had confidence that Iraq's judicial officials would guide those guards down the path of wisdom. And that, filled with enlightenment, they would willingly acknowledge their past deeds.

Or maybe the Prime Minister's media office figured that, one way or another, there would be video of a confession to show at the news conference.

Again: I really don't know what's behind that arrest warrant. But I think it's a too convenient for his political enemies than I find comfortable. Back to CNN:

"...The arrest warrant Monday came amid a political crisis and growing sectarian tensions in Baghdad that erupted just as the last U.S. soldiers exited Iraq over the weekend.

"Iraqiya, a powerful political bloc that draws support largely from Sunni and more secular Iraqis, said it was boycotting Parliament, a move that threatens to shatter Iraq's fragile power-sharing government.

"The move pits the largely Sunni and secular coalition against the government of Shiite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

"Iraqiya contends al-Maliki is trying to amass dictatorial power, and many believe al-Maliki was simply waiting for the Americans to leave before making his move...."
(CNN)

I don't envy folks who are honestly working to sort out the mess left by Saddam Hussein's decades in power. They've got hotheads to deal with coming in from several directions: Sunnis, Shiites. And, up north, Kurds:

"...Kurdish lawmaker Mahmoud Othman said Monday, 'I hope there wasn't a political influence in this arrest warrant, but in Iraq there has been always a political influence.'

" 'This is very upsetting and confusing,' Othman said, adding that if the accusations are true, then al-Hashimi 'should be brought to justice.'..."
(CNN)

I've been over this sort of thing before:

• "Pakistan, India, Mumbai, Nuclear Weapons, and Pashtunistan: Simple This Isn't"
  (December 27, 2008)
• "Turkey, Iraq, and Kurdistan"
  (October 16, 2007)

'The Masses,' Assumptions, and Getting a Grip

Here's where I get back to reporters, editors, and assumptions about 'gullible ignoramuses.' Briefly, I think that North America's coastal cultures have cherished beliefs that just aren't true:

"Six Ignorant Stereotypes About Middle America"
Paul Jankowski, Entrepreneurs, Forbes (October 5, 2011)

"What do you think of when you hear 'Heartland', 'the South' or 'Middle America'? If you're like a lot of people I know on the coasts, the first things that come to mind are usually not positive.

"This is a real quote from a marketing exec in New York City: 'I think the Heartland is a nice place to raise children. People are nice, but they're dumb, overweight, and gullible. They wear tacky clothing and jewelry. They're racist, unworldly, and dumb.'

"If you agree with the quote above, you need to get out a little more. Stereotypes exist for a reason, but if you’re trying to build a brand and engage consumers at a deep level, oversimplifications will hurt your cause. Stereotypes, taken to cynical extremes, are big-time brand killers...."
(Originally quoted in footnote 1, "My Take on the News: Jingle Bells, Jangled Nerves, and Good Advice," A Catholic Citizen in America (December 16, 2011))

I live in a state that's north of the 'flyover states,' have a counter-cultural view of folks living outside major metropolitan areas, and I've been over that before, too:

• "Small Town Hicks and Sophisticated Urbanites: A Reality Check"
  (November 9, 2009)
• "The New York Times, Insularity, and Assumptions"
  (October 21, 2008)

Other related posts:

• Iraq
  • "Another Big Bomb in Baghdad"
    (October 26, 2009)
  • "Using a Kid to Bomb a Mosque: Non-Western Cultural Values, Just Plain Evil, or Something Else?"
    (June 12, 2009)
  • "Good News from Iraq: Voter Fraud and Verbal Attacks on American Leaders"
    (February 15, 2009)
  • "Abu Ayyub al-Masri Free: Some Other Guy Arrested"
    (May 9, 2008)
  • "Abu Ayyub al-Masri: Captured (Again), Maybe, This Time in Mosul"
    (May 9, 2008)
• Getting a grip
  • "Marines Abandon Fallujah!!! (Or, Let's Keep Quiet About This)"
    (October 17, 2008)
  • "Army Report: Big Mistakes in Iraq!"
    (June 30, 2008)
    Particularly
    • Big Iraq Mistakes Report Creates Big Dilemma
  • "Iraq, Elections, the Usual News, and Kids With Inky Fingers"
    (March 7, 2010)
  • "Here Come the Weird Words: Election's Coming Up!"
    (December 14, 2007)
  • "Stressed-Out by Iraq? You're Not the Only One"
    (September 16, 2007)
• Abu Gharaib and all that
  • "Infected Killer Robots! Unstoppable Virus!! MILITARY DENIAL!!!!!!!!!? No, not exactly"
    (October 8, 2011)
  • "A Chilly Cell, the AP, the CIA, and Emotions"
    (March 28, 2010)
  • "Haditha, Iraq; My Lai, Vietnam: This Isn't the Good Old Days"
    (July 13, 2008)
  • "A Marine, A Puppy, and Serious Abuse: 'It Must be Real: I Saw it on YouTube!' "
    (March 4, 2008)
    Particularly
    • After Word: My Lai and Abu Ghraib, Perception and Reality
  • "Moral Equivalence, Prisoners, and Al Qaeda"
    (July 21, 2007)

CIA Informants Snatched in Pakistan - My Take

Pakistan's arrested CIA informants - folks who helped the CIA find Osama bin Laden. Who had been living in a slightly-fortified compound in a medium-size city about 31 miles from Islamabad.

I don't know - and don't have enough information to guess - whether the people who were arrested really were arrested: or whether the whole thing is some kind of plot. My guess is that they really were snatched, but maybe someone in Pakistan's leadership wants someone else to look bad. Or maybe a clerk didn't get treated the way he likes, and made up the story to get even. I doubt that - but it's possible.

Brigadier General Syed Azmat Ali says that a major wasn't arrested.¹ Maybe the major isn't a major any more - and so the Brigadier General's statement, "we ... deny that any such or any army officer..." is true. Now.

Or maybe the Brigadier General wants to live to see next year - or has family he's protecting.

From what I understand, the ISI is - really - what never-left-the-'60s liberals think the CIA is like. (December 27, 2008)

For the moment, I'm assuming that at least five people who helped the CIA find bin Laden are being held by the ISI. Or somebody with the muscle to pull a job like that, and have a Brigadier General provide an alibi.

What I don't know - and don't have enough information to guess - is whether the folks who've been snatched were targeted because they finked on bin Laden, or because they told the CIA instead of the 'right people' in Pakistan.

If this makes it seem like I don't have the highest regard for the folks who run various parts of Pakistan - you're perceptive. In my opinion, Pakistan is in better shape than Somalia: but it's just barely a "nation." More like a territory run by a feuding collection of tribal leaders, terrorists, warlords, and the occasional allegedly-elected official.

In the news:

"PAKISTAN'S ISI spy agency has arrested at least five CIA informants who helped lead US commandos to Osama bin Laden's Pakistan compound, highlighting the deepening fractures in the alliance.

"The five Pakistani informants, including an army major believed to have noted down the number plates of all vehicles that visited the Abbottabad compound, had been taken into custody, US officials confirmed to The New York Times yesterday.

"Last week, Pakistani army chief Ashfaq Parvaz Kayani announced he was ending all US military counter-insurgency training of his country's soldiers and imposing new restrictions on intelligence sharing between the nations...."
(The Australian)

---

"Pakistan's intelligence service has arrested the owner of a safe house rented to the CIA to observe Usama bin Laden's compound before the U.S. raid that killed the Al Qaeda leader, as well as a 'handful' of other Pakistanis, a U.S. official said late Tuesday.

"In Pakistan, a Western official confirmed a New York Times report that five of the Pakistani informants who fed information to the CIA before the May 2 bin Laden raid were arrested by Pakistan's top military spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence agency, known as ISI.

"The officials spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence matters...."
(Associated Press, via FoxNews.com)

Related posts:

• "Osama bin Laden: Questions, Answers, and Opinions"
  (May 4, 2011)
• "Pakistan, YouTube, Censorship and the Sixties"
  (May 20, 2010)
• "Pakistan Arrests (Alleged) Times Square Bomber's Financial Backers - By Jove! I Think They've Got It!"
  (May 15, 2010)
• "Pakistan's Bosses Diverted Money Earmarked for Military: No Surprise, But Quite a Disappointment"
  (October 5, 2009)
• "Pakistan, India, Mumbai, Nuclear Weapons, and Pashtunistan: Simple This Isn't"
  (December 27, 2008)

In the news:

• "Pakistan arrests CIA informants"
  Amanda Hodge, The Australian (June 16, 2011) It's 2:21 a.m., June 16, 2011, as I'm posting this)
• "Pakistani Forces Arrest CIA Informants Who Led U.S. to Usama Bin Laden"
  Associated Press, via FoxNews.com (June 15, 2011)
• "Pakistan Denies Arresting Army Major for US Ties"
  VOA News, Voice of America (June 15, 2011)

---

¹ From VOA News:

"A report in Wednesday's New York Times quotes unnamed U.S. intelligence officials as saying Pakistan has arrested five people, including a Pakistani military official, accused of passing information to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency prior to last month's U.S. raid in the Pakistani garrison town of Abbottabad that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden. The Times report exposes the growing friction between the U.S. and Pakistan in the wake of that operation.

"The New York Times article cites unnamed sources in the American intelligence community who claim that the five detainees include a Pakistani army major who copied the license plate numbers of cars visiting Bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad in the weeks leading up to the May 2 U.S. raid.

"Pakistani military spokesman Brigadier General Syed Azmat Ali emphasized that no Pakistani military personnel have been detained in relation to the Abbottabad raid.

" 'We categorically deny that any such or any army officer was arrested in connection with this,' said Azmat Ali...."
(VOA News)

Business-As-Usual in Bahrain: Poet Imprisoned

Ever wish people would stop criticizing the President?

Think 'there oughtta be a law' against saying bad things about America? Or Australia, or India, or whichever country you call "home?"

Some countries work that way:

"Bahrain tries ex-lawmakers, imprisons poet"
CNN (June 12, 2011)

"...Meanwhile, poet Ayat al-Qormozi, 20, was found guilty of assembling at Pearl Roundabout, the epicenter of anti-government demonstrations in the kingdom earlier this year. Additional charges included speaking out against Bahrain and the king.

"The Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights said she read a poem criticizing government policy at the Roundabout.

"Mubarak, the government official, said Bahrain had freedom of speech, but that there were limits.

" 'Freedom of speech in this country has its boundaries and cannot touch on the leadership, and cannot call for the overthrow of the government,' he said.

"Her poem, he said, 'caused incitement and hatred to his majesty the king and to the prime minister' with lines such as 'we are people who kill humiliation' and 'assassinate misery.'..."

I think it's reasonable, in America, that calling for the overthrow of our government to be illegal.

That's what we have elections for - to swap out the current nitwits for new ones, who at least may do less damage.

Laws against criticizing the government? That makes revolution sound more reasonable. As I recall, that's part of why colonists got fed up with George III's administration, back when.

And that isn't, quite, another topic.

Related posts:

• "Libya, Syria, Bahrain: Journalists Uncooperative; 'the Masses' Worse"
  (March 29, 2011)
• "Bahrain, Foreign Troops, and - Maybe - the Last Stand of Kings"
  (March 18, 2011)
• "Bahrain, Libya: My Take on the News"
  (February 19, 2011)
• "Bahrain, Libya: My Take on the News"
  (February 19, 2011)
• "Bahrain and the Information Age"
  (February 19, 2011)

Barack Obama's Birth Certificate, and Getting a Grip

As I've said before, this isn't a political blog. Not in the sense that I say one person or party is always right, and everybody who doesn't agree is stupid. I can't ignore politics, either, since this blog's topic is the war on terror - and politics affects decision-making.

I didn't vote for President Obama in the 2008 election, and I do not agree with many of his policies. But I am not "against" him as an individual. I think America could have a better president - and that's another topic.

Some reactions to candidate Obama and President Obama remind me of the way another set of folks reacted to George W. Bush. And that's not another topic.

There's been a sort of conspiracy theory going around that Barack Hussein Obama isn't a 'real' American. My guess is that the notion will be as firmly-planted in popular culture as the idea that the CIA blew up New York City's World Trade Center. Or that Elvis lives - although the latter seems to be fading.

Today's news is, in my opinion, interesting: but hardly a surprise; and almost certainly not the end of 'Obama ain't no reg'lr American.'

President Obama's Birth Certificate

A selection of news about Obama's birth certificate:

"This is the document the 'birthers' have clamored for -- President Obama's long-form certificate generated at the time of birth, with more details than the short-form summary the president previously had produced.

"His failure to make this document public is what the birther movement has used to argue Mr. Obama is not a U.S. citizen. They say the short-form (even though certified by the state of Hawaii) could be a phony document created well after the fact...."
(CBS News)

---

"The White House has released President Obama's long-form birth certificate, saying the document is 'proof positive' the president was born in Hawaii.

"The release marked an unexpected turn in the long-simmering, though widely discredited, controversy over Obama's origin. Obama's advisers have for the better part of three years dismissed questions about the president's birth, directing skeptics to the short-term document released during the 2008 campaign. But as the issue gained more attention at the state level and particularly in the 2012 presidential race, Obama said Wednesday that it was starting to distract attention from pressing challenges like the budget...."
(FoxNews.com)

---

"President Barack Obama released his long-form birth certificate, saying he wanted to end the "silliness" of false claims he was born outside U.S. that were distracting from urgent debates over the nation's future.

"Renewed questions about his birth have dominated the news in recent weeks even as the country is in the middle of a debate about the federal budget and how to cut the nation's debt, Obama, 49, said at the White House. He said the issue should have been settled during the 2008 campaign and that he wouldn't normally engage critics who are raising the issue...."
(The San Francisco Chronicle)

(FoxNews.com, via Snopes.com, used w/o permission)

Could it be a forgery? Is this part of a massive conspiracy? Are space-alien, shape-shifting, lizard-men involved?

Could be, but I doubt it.

Barack Obama, and Plan 9 From Outer Space

I've discussed the president's birth record before:

"...All public knowledge of Barack Obama indicates - strongly - that he was born about 10 years after I was, in the State of Hawaii. And it turns out that he may not have a 'long-form, hospital-generated birth certificate ... within the vital records maintained by the Hawaii Department of Health.'¹

"Does this mean he's not 'really' an American? Or that 'the truth is out there,' and some vast conspiracy is keeping 'regular Americans' from knowing it?

"At this point, I don't think so. Or, rather, I don't think there's reason to assume that Barack Obama isn't, legally, an American citizen, born in one of the 50 states.

Although just barely. Hawaii became a state in 1959. Oddly, I haven't run into anybody claiming that Hawaii isn't really a state in this country. And that's almost another topic...."
(January 29, 2011)

I think that most folks, if they've tried dealing with government bureaucracies, would agree that a state office taking a year or so to dredge up a particular record - isn't really all that surprising.

In my considered opinion, I think that President Barack Obama:

• Is definitely not a WASP
• Has a distinctly non-British name
• Was
  • Born in Hawaii
  • A legal candidate in 2008
  • The current president of the United States

I also think that the CIA did not blow up New York City's World Trade Center.

Conspiracy theories can make entertaining stories. But the notion that Barack Obama isn't 'really' an American? I think that's as plausible as the screenplay for Plan 9 From Outer Space.

Why Release the Birth Certificate Now?

As I said, this isn't a political blog - but who wins the 2012 presidential election will make a difference in how America reacts to folks who want to kill Americans.

I ran into this opinion on televised news: that Obama released his birth certificate now, because Donald Trump has been making an issue of it. I think that's a plausible bit of speculation.

The argument is that Obama wants to win the 2012 presidential election - and to do so will have to get more votes than the Republican candidate. Donald Trump apparently wants to be the Republican presidential candidate in 2012 - and Barack Obama wants to run against Donald Trump.

Related posts:

• "President Obama, Hawaii, a Governor, and Getting a Grip"
  (January 29, 2011)
• "'Rush Limbaugh Shot Giffords!?' Opinion Polls, Tuscon, and Loughner's Mind"
  (January 12, 2011)
• "A Chilly Cell, the AP, the CIA, and Emotions"
  (March 28, 2010)
• "The Sign Says 'Obama Half-Breed Muslin' - Freedom of Speech, Politics, Spelling, and Race"
  (October 1, 2008)
• "Barack Obama isn't American: He's Kenyan (?!)"
  (November 5, 2008)
• "Sarah Palin's a Nazi: I Saw it on Television"
  (October 20, 2008)

News and views:

• "Will Obama birth certificate release put the issue to rest?"
  Jan Crawford, CBS News (April 27, 2011)
• "White House Releases Obama's Long-Form Birth Certificate"
  FoxNews.com (April 27, 2011)
• "Obama Says Questions About Birth a Distraction From Issues"
  Business Report, The Chronicle with Bloomberg, The San Francisco Chronicle (April 26, 2011, updated April 27, 2011)