mr mahs

Your balkan complaint is getting stale.... Nobody gives a shit....

WHAT? The insurgency on AMERICAN FORCES trying to build back the country isn't terrorism? Oh yeah you know more then a Kurd who actually lives there...So the insurgency against the americans is justified? The riot on Sunday is warranted when all we want is peace and hand over sovereignty?

what

How can they?

Not even close!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3607501.stm Shia split over Iraqi 'uprising' By Roger Hardy BBC Middle East analyst Iraqi Shia are divided in their response to the outbreak of violence between coalition forces and the supporters of cleric Moqtada Sadr. What is going on in Iraq is not a Shia uprising, though many people are asking whether it might become one. But it suits Moqtada Sadr to call it an uprising - in Arabic an "intifada" - because that puts his campaign of resistance on the same level as the Palestinian struggle against Israeli occupation. Sadr's supporters in Basra occupied the governor's house on Monday And in the Iraqi context, the word has another meaning too. The young cleric wants Iraqis to believe he is in the same heroic mould as the men who led the revolt of 1920 against British colonial rule. The three-month revolt - which the British subdued with RAF bombers - has become an important part of Iraq's historical memory. Repeating a mistake? But some Iraqis draw a very different lesson from the events of 80 years ago. They argue that by fighting the British, the Shia simply ensured that the British, (following the example of the Ottoman Turks,) would entrust the government of Iraq to a Sunni elite - a pattern which continued until the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime last year. Thoughtful Iraqis warn that if the Shia make the same mistake now, they could lose a unique opportunity to win a share of power which reflects their majority status. But the Shia are divided between those who realise this and those who are being swept along on a tide of angry anti-Americanism. The country's most senior Shia cleric, Ayatollah Sistani, has so far been cautious in the public statements issued in his name. Whatever he may be feeling privately, the ayatollah clearly has no wish to be seen taking America's side at a time when Shia blood is being spilt. The Americans are sounding tough, saying they will arrest Moqtada Sadr and crush his militia. They seem to have lost patience with quiet, behind-the-scenes mediation. But if the violence continues and the silent majority remains silent, Sadr's support may grow.

Line between militias, civilians blurred in Iraq BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Judging by the wounds and death toll, the nighttime battles between radical Shi'ites and U.S. troops in Baghdad's Sadr City slum are fierce and the tactics dirty. But determining whether the casualties are civilians or militiamen loyal to fiery cleric Moqtada al-Sadr may be impossible as fighting rages after dark in a district closed off by many American tanks. Both sides are likely to try to win the media war, with Sadr's militants saying they were only protecting civilians and the Americans insisting they were fighting outlaws who threatened security. The wounded in hospitals tell the same stories in Sadr City, where militiamen loyal to Sadr are challenging American soldiers late at night in battles. Most say they were shot with no warning by U.S. troops while walking at night in the densely populated slum of about 2 million people. Ali Saghir, whose arm was broken by a bullet, said he brought the man in the bed across from him to the hospital after he was shot. He was attending to another victim of the clashes when he himself was shot. "I was suddenly shot in the arm and legs. I did nothing to provoke it. I was just helping someone," he said. It is difficult to piece together what happened from hospital wards in Sadr City, where doctors said 50 civilians have been killed and 185 wounded since the fighting erupted Sunday. Eight U.S. soldiers have also been killed in the slum. DOCTORS FRIGHTENED A doctor named Khaled in Sadr City who asked that his family name and hospital remain anonymous said he had been treating some shrapnel wounds but that many cases also involved precise, single bullet wounds to the legs or arms. "These have to be snipers. They are very precise hits. Yesterday, we had two cases of bullets that entered just below the right hip and left from the inner thigh," he said. "From the patient's accounts, the attacks took place at exactly the same location almost at the same time." He suspects most of the wounded were civilians and about 20 to 30 percent were militiamen, but there was no way of telling, especially under his working conditions. "Some things don't make sense, especially with the younger patients who are of fighting age. What were they doing walking at night during this fighting?" said Khaled. "I really can't talk to my patients about who they are. I am scared. I feel as if I could be killed at any minute. It is similar to Saddam Hussein's system." Officially, the hospital is run by the Ministry of Health. But men in black with Kalashnikovs strapped on their shoulders run the show. One of them left his weapon downstairs and closely listened to Khaled, who soon switched to English to complain. "If a patient dies, they threaten me and ask why I didn't save him. I am not a messenger of God. I am a doctor." Across the room, the wife of a patient in critical condition said he was simply driving along a road when the Americans opened fire. "Why did they do this?" she asked

Right but you're missing the point. Al jazeera is reporting X amount of Iraqi civilians died right? How do we know they're civilians? The site makes it out we are just slaughtering everyone in site... The whole town is against us so in a way we should n't be holding back but we are.. This whole mess as well as the town can be done with in hours, and I don't mean nukes...

Do you disagree that the line between the insurgents and civilians is blurred?

And Al sadr calling to arms his followers is going to cause a world of hurt for both sides. Like I said.. Feedom of speech is one thing but telling b;lantant lies is another and can't be tolerated...

Regular civilians holding RPG'S aren't civilians anymore and deserve to die!!!!!

20%

uh OH Treasury to Probe Kerry Tax Analysts Wed Apr 7, 9:00 AM ET Add White House - AP Cabinet & State to My Yahoo! By JEANNINE AVERSA, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON - The Treasury Department (news - web sites)'s inspector general is looking into the agency's decision to analyze presumptive Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry (news - web sites)'s tax proposals. "We're going to do a preliminary inquiry into what was produced," Richard Delmar, counsel in the Office of Inspector General, said Tuesday. "We're trying to determine the facts of what happened," Delmar said. "Depending on the facts we learn, something else may happen or not," he said. The inquiry will look into allegations first reported by The Wall Street Journal that civil servants were used to calculate the costs of Kerry's tax plan, Delmar said. Federal law bars civil servants from working on political campaigns while on duty. Treasury posted the analysis of Kerry's tax plan on its Web site on March 22. Department spokesman Rob Nichols didn't comment on the inspector general's decision to look into the analysis of Kerry's tax plan, but he defended the agency's action. "It is proper for the for the Treasury Department to analyze tax proposals so that members of Congress and the administration can be informed," Nichols said. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, had requested that Treasury conduct the cost analysis. The department's analysis of Kerry's plan had ignited criticism from some Democrats, including Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., who wanted Treasury's inspector general to determine whether any laws were broken. "This `preliminary inquiry' should be a full-blown investigation into whether or not administration officials violated laws by using federal property and taxpayer dollars to finance the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign, Lautenberg said Tuesday. Kerry's campaign manager, Mary Beth Cahill, welcomed the inquiry. "The use of government employees to analyze John Kerry's economic plan is an illegal use of resources," she said. ___ On the Net:

Now thats an ignorant statement when 2/3rds of the country is fine. During the IRAQ WAR the sunni triangle didn't see much action and remember the faydaheen just dispersing back into the population? where do you think they have assembled again? The papers you like to read like Guardian and CNN are portarying this a country wide inferno uprising when that's just not true.. Buried on the Aljazeera site is a article about the sentiment shared to the north by the Kurds ... While Shia and Sunni Muslims have been fighting Americans in and around Baghdad in the past few days, Kurds on the streets of Arbil condemn anti-US attacks as "terrorism". Even though I loath the site here's the link http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/B078FEB0-8180-411F-A09A-EA2DBDAE316D.htm

How do we show the people the truth when a respected cleric is spreading lies?

Fuckem I am tired of the Pentagon handling these fucks with white kiddie gloves

It went over your head you ignorant fuck... Look at the pics jerkoff, these poeple are walking around the city in their pajamas with RPG's.. What do you think happens when one gets killed? you don't think other militia take their weapons? Is your feeble mind uncapable of understanding that a media struggle is taking place, where a live Iraqi insurgent is suddenly turned into a civilian onced they've been taken out? Can't you see whats happening?

who?

popular shi'ite newspaper? It's one thing to have freedom of speech but it's another thing to yell fire in a movie theater. Al sadr newspaper was blaming the U.S for the terrorist bombings that have been claimed by Zarqawi insurgents. It's a good thing the paper was shut down. It's a battle of ideas as well and we cannot tolerate a radical cleric spreading lies and ignoring the positives.

Al Sadr support is from a small fraction of the shiats population, the majority denounce his rhetoric as counter productive. What kills me is that Aljazeera is reporting that 90civilians were killed. If you look at the insurgents there wearing civilian cloths so how do they know they were civilians? I am not doubting that civilains have been hurt or killed but Al jazeera doesn't mention the casulaties as part of the militia only as civilians... Read this a couple of times and it jumps up at you... http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/660FF109-9E21-4AF8-BCA3-C39E0FE67917.htm

Aljazeera is only adding to the problem

Whats funny is diffrent sites give diffrent accounts of where the fighting is occuring..

Al Qaeda absent from final Clinton report By James G. Lakely THE WASHINGTON TIMES The final policy paper on national security that President Clinton submitted to Congress — 45,000 words long — makes no mention of al Qaeda and refers to Osama bin Laden by name just four times. The scarce references to bin Laden and his terror network undercut claims by former White House terrorism analyst Richard A. Clarke that the Clinton administration considered al Qaeda an "urgent" threat, while President Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, "ignored" it. The Clinton document, titled "A National Security Strategy for a Global Age," is dated December 2000 and is the final official assessment of national security policy and strategy by the Clinton team. The document is publicly available, though no U.S. media outlets have examined it in the context of Mr. Clarke's testimony and new book. Miss Rice, who will testify publicly Thursday before the commission investigating the Bush and Clinton administrations' actions before the September 11 attacks, was criticized last week for planning a speech for September 11, 2001, that called a national missile-defense system a leading security priority. President Bush yesterday denied the accusation that his administration had made dealing with al Qaeda a low priority. "Let me just be very clear about this: Had we had the information that was necessary to stop an attack, I'd have stopped the attack," Mr. Bush said, adding that after September 11, "the stakes had changed." "This country immediately went on war footing, and we went to war against al Qaeda. It took me very little time to make up my mind," he said. "Once I determined al Qaeda [did] it, [i said], 'We're going to go get them.' And we have, and we're going to keep after them until they're brought to justice and America is secure." Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney will meet with the commission in the coming weeks behind closed doors, but a date has not been set. Meanwhile, the president said he looks forward to hearing Miss Rice defend the administration in a public forum. "She'll be great," Mr. Bush said. "She's a very smart, capable person who knows exactly what took place and will lay out the facts." The Clinton administration's final national-security report stated that its reaction to terrorist strikes was to "neither forget the crime, nor ever give up on bringing the perpetrators to justice." The document boasted of "a dozen terrorist fugitives" who had been captured abroad and handed over to the United States "to answer for their crimes." Those perpetrators included the men responsible for the first attack on the World Trade Center, which the intelligence community largely thought by late 2000 to be the work of operatives with links to al Qaeda. Listed among those brought to justice was a man who killed two persons outside CIA headquarters in 1993, and "an attack on a Pan Am flight more than 18 years ago." Several high-ranking Bush administration officials, and the president himself, have faulted the Clinton administration for treating global terrorism as a law enforcement issue and not recognizing that bin Laden declared war on the United States in 1998. Mr. Bush often notes that about two-thirds of al Qaeda's thousands of members — including many key leaders — have been either captured or killed since the attacks, and that 44 of the 55 top Iraqi officials under Saddam Hussein in a deck of cards have been "taken care of." The liberal Center for American Progress yesterday echoed Mr. Clarke's criticism of the Bush administration by publishing a timeline of statements that it says proves the current White House national security team did not make fighting al Qaeda a priority before the attacks. "If they were developing some big strategy of fighting terrorism, it's not reflected in their words," said John Halpin, director of research for the center. "We wanted to go back and document all the public statements, given some of the discrepancies of what happened before 9/11 and some of the recent news from Richard Clarke," Mr. Halpin said. In Mr. Clarke's best-selling book "Against All Enemies," he writes that during a transitional briefing in January 2001, Miss Rice's "facial expression gave me the impression that she'd never heard the term [al Qaeda] before." But the Clinton administration's final national security document, written while Mr. Clarke was a high-level national security adviser, never mentions al Qaeda. "Clarke was on the job as terrorism czar at that point," said a senior Bush administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "He played a significant role. His concerns should have been well-known." High-ranking Bush administration officials, including Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, have testified that Mr. Bush wanted to stop "swatting at flies" and take a more aggressive approach to terror. The Bush administration official noted that the planning of the September 11 attacks happened while Mr. Clinton was in power, and said the commission's probe has turned into a search for blame. "It's a shame we are not focused more on moving forward, instead of about who was concerned more," he said. The official said he found the lack of bin Laden and al Qaeda references in the final Clinton terror assessment interesting, but downplayed such "word-counting games." "We don't measure progress or response [to terrorism] by how many speeches, words, utterances or meetings were held on a particular issue, but by action taken," he said.

And thousands of planes in the air per day....