Article: Get out now.

It can't get worse than the political leaders of Iraq dictating what our troops
can do. We all are told by big bro 43 that we must trust Petraeus, but the
Iraqis are ordering our troops to stand down in a fight Petraeus tells us we
must finish.

The article "Iraqi Political Leaders Protest US Siege of Sadr City" at
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/042808J.shtml
states "About 50 leaders representing a variety of Iraqi political blocs took to
Baghdad's Sadr City on Sunday, a stronghold of fiery religious leader Muqtada al
Sadr, to protest the U.S.-led siege of that area."

We always think of ourselves as the super-power, the sophisticated group, but these Iraqis are playing us.

The article continues "The leaders promised to work together with Sadrists to remove insurgents and weapons in the area. But they also had six other demands of the government, including that it immediately suspend military activity in the city, supply basic services to residents and prioritize peaceful solutions over military conflicts.
"Whatever point the crisis reaches we will keep our efforts to put an end to it," said Ahmed Radhi, a member of the Iraqi Accordance Front, the largest Sunni Muslim bloc. Radhi said the leaders formed a committee to meet with Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki to solve problems plaguing Sadr City.
"We have a delegation meeting with Maliki to let him know the real situation
going on in the city," said Nassar al Rubaie, a Sadrist. "We have lawmakers from
different blocs and parties to come and watch the situation on the ground."
Lawmakers representing the Iraqi National Accord, the Iraqi Front for National
Dialogue and the Kurdish alliance also were present. The leaders said they were
moved by pictures of civilian casualties as well as the health crisis plaguing residents in Sadr City.
The protest came just days after Sadr instructed his Mahdi Army militia to stop
fighting the mostly Shiite Iraqi security forces in Sadr City and the southern
port city of Basra. The U.S.-backed Iraqi forces have continually battled with
insurgents in both areas since Maliki led a siege of Basra at the end of March."

Why are we in the middle of fights between one group of Shiites and others
especially when whenever Maliki's Shiite government tells us to stop we do? How
can this be furthering US interests in the region?

These non-Sadrist Iraqis have something up their sleeves as the article "Militia crackdown pays off for al-Maliki" at
click here
describes "The fortunes of Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki have received
an unexpected boost from his initially botched offensive against militias in
Basra, which has turned into a standoff between al-Maliki and the Shiite Mahdi
Army militia.
The showdown is recalibrating the political balance in Iraq in ways that could
help break the deadlock that has stalled progress on key measures including a
new oil law and the broader issue of national reconciliation.
Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds have rallied behind al-Maliki's insistence that the
Mahdi Army loyal to hardline cleric Muqtada al-Sadr must disarm, creating a rare
consensus among most of the factions constituting Iraq's fractious parliament.
The main Sunni bloc, the Iraqi Accord Front is now saying it will return to the
government, lending hope that Iraq's malfunctioning government can finally get
to work. The bloc had pulled out nine months ago, complaining about al-Maliki's
performance.
"It was a very bold step of Maliki's to take on these militias, so we have to
say he's doing a good job," said Salim Abdullah, the spokesman for the Sunni
bloc, which blames the Mahdi Army for many of the sectarian killings of Sunnis
in recent years.
The only group left outside the consensus is the Sadrists, whose 32
parliamentarians were instrumental in securing al-Maliki's election as prime
minister in 2006.
The perception that al-Maliki was beholden to the Sadrists underpinned much of
the mistrust that has blocked political progress in Iraq. Holding the balance of
power in parliament and backed by the muscle of their militia on the streets,
the Sadrists had become the group no one dared to offend.
That is why al-Maliki's decision to move against them has proved so
transformational, said independent parliamentarian Mithal al-Alusi. No one had
expected al-Maliki to confront the Sadrists, but once he did, the aura of
invincibility surrounding them evaporated."

McCain will proclaim that he has worked with Democrats to pass legislation that
has benefited the majority of the US, but that is just a lie. He's as phony as
Maliki as is. He'd have to be as he is in league with Maliki's US sponsor big bro 43 and any legislation McCain passed with Democrats had a secret GOP benefit in it as no one in that morally bankrupt group does a humanitarian activity without "hidden agendas" being attached.

McCain's signature legislation is campaign financing. Isn't McCain's use of his
wife's airplane a campaign financing violation? If the "Straight Talk Express"
can't be straight in its primary policy what can you expect in other areas?

On 'Countdown with Keith Olbermann' for Monday, April 28 at
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24369344/
Olbermann and MSNBC political analyst Rachel Maddow were discussing McCain
being, as Olbermann said "This issue of being in touch with the poor; McCain was
he on his wife's air bud plane when he said that?
To which Maddow replied "Who has the foresight to write into campaign finance
legislation a loophole that exempts your personal family corporate jet from
campaign loopholes? I don't know that this puts him more in touch with the
poor. It does establish his rich guy cajones like nothing else I have seen."

An analogy with McCain and equally corrupt GOP operatives and Iraqi politicians
is obvious. In Iraq when Maliki shafts Sadr the inhabitants in Sadr city get
starved to death and killed in the crossfire between US soldiers and people in
the same sect as their own, but who follow Maliki or al-Hakim. McCain's policies
also will result in innocents' deaths if he follows through on his plan to keep
US soldiers in Iraq. Even if they are in protected areas, as the US troops in
Korea are, won't McCain have the GOP urge to expand the war into Iran? "Tricky
Dick" couldn't fight the temptation. Why will McCain be able to do so?

One of the greatest examples of this is the Iraqi reconstruction. Big bro 43's
CEO chums in the reconstruction business pose as do-gooders. They've bilked us
out of hundreds of billions of dollars for uncompleted work.

The article "Investigators: Millions in Iraq contracts never finished" at
click here
states "Millions of dollars of lucrative Iraq reconstruction contracts were
never finished because of excessive delays, poor performance or other factors,
including failed projects that are being falsely described by the U.S.
government as complete, federal investigators say.
The audit released Sunday by Stuart Bowen Jr., the special inspector general for
Iraq reconstruction, provides the latest snapshot of an uneven reconstruction
effort that has cost U.S. taxpayers more than $100 billion. It also comes as several lawmakers have said they want the Iraqis to pick up more of the cost of reconstruction.
The special IG's review of 47,321 reconstruction projects worth billions of
dollars found that at least 855 contracts were terminated by U.S. officials
before their completion, primarily because of unforeseen factors such as
violence and excessive costs. About 112 of those agreements were ended
specifically because of the contractors' actual or anticipated poor performance.
In addition, the audit said many reconstruction projects were being described as
complete or otherwise successful when they were not. In one case, the U.S.
Agency for International Development contracted with Bechtel Corp. in 2004 to
construct a $50 million children's hospital in Basra, only to "essentially
terminate" the project in 2006 because of monthslong delays.
But rather than terminate the project, U.S. officials modified the contract to
change the scope of the work. As a result, a U.S. database of Iraq
reconstruction contracts shows the project as complete "when in fact the
hospital was only 35 percent complete when work was stopped," said investigators
in describing the practice of "descoping" as frequent."

We can't go on paying the Halliburtons of the world forever, even the
congressional GOP members realizes this as the article continues "The audit
comes amid renewed focus in recent months on potential abuse in contracting government-wide, such as Iraq reconstruction. Last year, congressional investigators said as much as $10 billion - or one in six dollars
- charged by U.S. contractors for Iraq reconstruction were questionable or unsupported, and warned that significantly more taxpayer money was at risk."

Fighting against Sadr has never gone well for the US.

The article "Surge in Iraq violence kills more US troops" at
click here
shows how our troops are being sucked into the absolutely the worst situation
yet in this hellish urban guerrilla warfare.

The article states "Four US soldiers have been killed along with scores of
militants following two days of fighting in the Baghdad slum of Sadr City and
rocket fire elsewhere in the capital.
The latest casualties, announced yesterday, make April the deadliest month in
Iraq for the US military since last September, with at least 44 soldiers dying,
according to a toll by the Associated Press.
Casualties had declined in recent months in line with a sharp drop in violence.
But attack levels have rebounded slightly in the past few weeks as Iraqi and US
forces push into the Shia militia strongholds of Sadr City in Baghdad and Basra
in the south of the country....
US forces are pushing into Sadr City, from where many of the rockets directed at
the Green Zone are launched, to prevent militants from launching the missiles.
Thirty Iraqi lawmakers from various political parties yesterday however urged Mr
Maliki to end the month-long confrontation, saying innocent civilians and
children were the main victims of the fighting.
"Yes, you can do it if you remember your own children," said a joint statement
read by Mustafa al-Heeti, a Sunni Member of Parliament. "Your people are
demanding of you to intervene and solve the crisis peacefully."

We are helping the al-quedas of the world to recruit when our occupation kills
children.

The article "U.S. Role Deepens in Sadr City -- Fierce Battle Against Shiite Militiamen Echoes First Years of War" at
click here
describes the devastating unintended consequences the US has incurred as a
result of following big bro 43's weak, Iraqi, Shiite, stooge, Maliki, into a
battle against another Iraqi, Sadr, who is Shiite, but anything but weak.

The article states "A four-hour battle Tuesday between U.S. soldiers and Shiite
militiamen left at least 28 Iraqis dead in the capital's Sadr City neighborhood,
making it one of the bloodiest days in a month of sustained street fighting.
The clashes underscored how deeply U.S. forces have been drawn into heavy combat in the huge Shiite district since Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki unexpectedly
launched an offensive in southern Iraq last month against Shiite militias,
primarily the Mahdi Army of anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
Until Maliki's push into the southern city of Basra, U.S. troops were not
intensely engaged in Sadr City, a Baghdad neighborhood of roughly 3 million
people that was among the most treacherous areas for U.S. forces early in the
war.
But the southern offensive set off a violent chain reaction that spread quickly
to Shiite sectors of the capital and has severely strained the cease-fire Sadr
imposed on his followers in August and recently reaffirmed. U.S. troops,
fighting at times Tuesday on foot and backed by air support, are now engaged in
the kind of urban battle within Sadr's stronghold reminiscent of the first years
of the war.
More than 500 people have been killed and 2,100 injured in Sadr City since
fighting erupted there again in late March, according to lawmakers loyal to
Sadr. Residents of Sadr City said Tuesday's death toll was at least 50. The U.S.
military said it has killed more than 200 fighters in the past month in the
area, where it says militiamen have fired 600 rockets and mortars at U.S. and
Iraqi targets.
The conflict has pitted Sadr, who leads Iraq's largest militia and one of the
most popular Shiite political organizations, against Shiite-led government
forces and the U.S. troops backing them. The impoverished Sadr City district has
been sealed off by U.S. and Iraqi forces from the rest of the city.
"Sadr City right now is like a city of ghosts," said Abu Haider al-Bahadili, 43,
a Mahdi Army fighter who spoke by telephone from Sadr City as spasms of gunfire
rang out nearby. "It has turned from a city into a field of battle."

We are making ghost towns and killing children thanks to W!

The article continues "U.S. officials emphasized that U.S. troops responded only
after they were attacked and that it was the fault of the militiamen if there
were civilian casualties.
"The sole burden of responsibility lies on the shoulders of the militants who
care nothing for the Iraqi people," Lt. Col. Steve Stover, a U.S. military
spokesman said in an e-mail.
He said the militiamen purposely attack from buildings and alleyways in densely
populated areas, hoping to protect themselves by hiding among civilians. "What
does that say about the enemy?" Stover said. "He is heartless and evil."
The protracted clashes in Sadr City appear to be the unintended consequence of
the offensive that Maliki launched in Basra without consulting U.S. officials."
But much of the country remained worried about the fighting in Sadr City and
whether it would spark a full-scale uprising by the Sadrist movement.
Sadr has threatened to call off the eight-month cease-fire, which has been
widely credited with lowering the level of violence in Iraq, if the government
does not end its offensive against his followers.
Ali al-Dabbagh, the Iraqi government spokesman, did not respond to repeated
calls for comment. Followers of Sadr, however, said they were growing more eager
for an all-out war to defend themselves.
"We are very close to the Zero Hour," said Ala'a Abd, 30, a Mahdi Army member in
the Shiite holy city of Najaf, using an Arabic expression meaning that time is
up. "Everyone should realize that."

"We are very close to the Zero Hour" thanks to W!

The article "Selling the president's general" at
click here
describes how and why Petraeus was positioned to betray us.

The article states "You simply can't pile up enough adjectives when it comes to the general, who, at a relatively young age was already a runner-up for Time Magazine's Person of the Year in 2007. His record is stellar. His tactical sense extraordinary. His strategic ability, when it comes to mounting a campaign, beyond compare.
I'm speaking, of course, of General David Petraeus, President George W Bush's "surge" commander in Iraq and, as of last week, the newly nominated head of US Central Command (CENTCOM) for all of the Middle East and beyond - "King David" to those of his peers who haven't exactly taken a shine to his reportedly "high self-regard". And the campaign I have in mind has been his years of wooing and winning the American media, in the process of which he sold himself as a true American hero, a Caesar of celebrity.
As far as can be told, there's never been a seat in his helicopter that couldn't be filled by a friendly (or adoring) reporter. This, after all, is the man who, in the summer of 2004, as a mere three-star general being sent back to Baghdad to train the Iraqi army, made Newsweek's cover under the caption, "Can This Man Save Iraq?" (The article's subtitle - with the "yes" practically etched into it - read: "Mission Impossible? David Petraeus Is Tasked with Rebuilding Iraq's Security Forces. An Up-close Look at the Only Real Exit Plan the United States Has - the Man Himself").
And, oh yes, as for his actual generalship on the battlefield of Iraq ... Well, the verdict may still officially be out, but the record, the tactics and the strategic ability look like they will not stand the test of time. But by then, if all goes well, he'll once again be out of town and someone else will take the blame, while he continues to fall upwards. Petraeus is the president's anointed general, Bush's commander of commanders, and (not surprisingly) he exhibits certain traits much admired by the Bush administration in its better days."

He fits into W's narrative of Iraq as well as "Mission Accomplished does". He has the same reverse Midas touch that big bro 43 has. Why else would w select him? He's just a failure at everything as has been Rumsfeld, Cheney, Maliki and everyone you can think of who has been involved in Iraq-including Petreus.

The article summarizes Petraeus' failure as "Mosul has remained a hotspot of insurgency ever since. On his next tour, when it came to all the "progress" training the Iraqi army, let Rod Nordland, the author of that "fawning" - his retrospective adjective, not mine - Newsweek cover piece of 2004, suggest an obituary, as he did in 2007:
[Petraeus] rose to fame not by his achievements but by his success in selling
them as achievements. He's first of all a great communicator ... Training the
Iraqi military and shifting responsibility to them was the mantra Petraeus sold
to hundreds of credulous reporters and hundreds of even more credulous visiting
CODELs (congressional delegations)... By the time he left, the training program
was clearly on its way to spectacular failure. By the end of last year that had
become received wisdom; it became convenient for the brass to blame the fiasco
on the politically less popular and media-friendless General George Casey.
Entire brigades of police had to be pulled off the street and retrained because
they were evidently riddled with death squads and in some cases even with
insurgents. The Iraqi army was all but useless, a feeble patient kept on life
support by the American military.
Just recently, in hearings before Congress, Petraeus himself introduced two new words to describe the post-"surge" security situation in Iraq: "fragile and
reversible". Take that as a tip for the future. Fragile indeed. The "surge"
landscape the general helped create has, from the beginning, been flammable and
unstable in the extreme."

For Rove it is creating the reality that the media and public will be forced to swallow.

The article concludes "The problem is: putting a face - that is, a mask - on something has nothing to do with changing it in any essential way, no matter how you brand it and no matter who's listening to you elsewhere. This August or September, when the general takes over at CENTCOM, he will leave behind (as he has before) the equivalent of a mined stretch of Iraqi roadside ready to explode, possibly under the coming US presidential election. It remains to be seen whether he will once again have made it out of town in the nick of time and relatively unscathed.

The miracle was that, so late in the game, the American media swallowed the
president's (and the general's) propaganda on the "surge" campaign which, on the
face of it, was ludicrous. Stranger still, they did so for almost a year before
the situation started to fray visibly enough for US TV networks and major papers
to take notice. For that year, most of them thought they saw a brass band
playing fabulously when there was hardly a snare drum in sight.

That result may be a public relations man's dream, but it was thanks to a con
man's art. The question is: Can the president make it back to Texas before the
bottom falls out in Iraq? And will the general continue to fall ominously upward?"

The Iraq war was a product rolled out for the 1st midterm election in W's administration. Rove knew that there has always been 5 to 10% of the US populace that gets their rocks off by seeing the US military killing some foreign enemy. Just like the Pusher in Steppenwolf's song W produce a product, nightly death and violence on the TV, that fed their desire-and just like the Pusher man, God damn you big bro 43 for feeding the red staters moribund desires for their blood stained votes.

Big bro 43 made bin laden and al zarqawi into super-villians. Just as they made
petraeus into a super-hero because red staters, those devotees of NASCAR and
World Wide Federation of Wrestling need individuals to wear the black and white
capes. Rove substituted sound bites for policy and we all suffered that lack of morality.

Now as the article by Dana Milbank "Five Years, Two Words, No Letup" at
click here
describes we've had 5 years after we had heard that "puppet boy" have his "Mission Accomplished" photo-op. it was timed to give red staters the idea that we had won a quick victory. The article has this Democrat rebuttal of W stating "By tradition, the proper gift for a fifth anniversary is something made of wood.
Jack Murtha must know this, for in observing the fifth anniversary yesterday of
President Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech, he gave the president a
rhetorical two-by-four to the head.
"Five years ago today, President Bush addressed our nation and the world from
the USS Abraham Lincoln only 42 days after he ordered the invasion of Iraq; he
declared 'Mission Accomplished,' " the Democratic congressman from Pennsylvania
declared at the liberal Center for American Progress. "One thousand, eight
hundred and twenty-seven days later, the U.S. occupation of Iraq continues and
our mission remains undefined."
Murtha -- ticking off statistics about doom and misery in Iraq -- couldn't help
adding in a sly reference to the flight suit Bush wore that day for his
aircraft-carrier- landing stunt. "I was going to wear my field uniform today,
but I decided it didn't fit," the bulky Vietnam veteran said. "It shrunk."
For the Bush White House, May Day has become one of the least favorite spots on
the calendar -- a time to remember when the president appeared in 2003 aboard
the carrier, his flight suit hugging all the right places, to proclaim victory
in "the battle of Iraq" underneath a huge "Mission Accomplished" banner.
Now, after half a trillion dollars and the deaths of 4,000 troops and tens of
thousands of Iraqis, the president's spin doctors have waved the white flag of
surrender over the USS Abraham Lincoln episode. "President Bush is well aware
that the banner should have been much more specific, and said mission
accomplished for these sailors who are on this ship on their mission," White
House press secretary Dana Perino told reporters this week.
That excuse didn't pass the laugh test yesterday morning, when a CNN reporter
asked Murtha about it. Murtha shook his head and gave a disgusted sigh as
audience members chuckled. "It's almost beyond my belief that they would think
anybody would believe that," he finally said. "I'm sure the White House didn't
tell [her] to say that," he added, charitably. "I'm sure that was offhand."

The article "The Escape Artist" also by Dana Milbank at
click here
describes how big bro 43 is also depending upon hypocrisy to assuage the US voters hatred of him as "The incredible shrinking presidency of George Walker Bush hit a new milestone yesterday: The commander in chief turned to sorcery.
"You know, if there was a magic wand to wave, I'd be waving it," Bush informed
Sheryl Gay Stolberg of the New York Times in a Rose Garden news conference. She
had asked him about the recession, which everybody seems to be acknowledging but
Bush.
Further, the wizard of the West Wing said he would use his supernatural powers,
if he had them, to conjure up lower gas prices. "I think that if there was a
magic wand and say, 'Okay, drop price,' I'd do that," said the illusionist.
Abracadabra! Watch the president pull a rabbit out of a hat! See his low ratings
vanish before your very eyes!
Well, not this time. "There is no magic wand to wave right now," Bush finally
confessed to Stolberg.
But the president had something else up his sleeve. He used his appearance
before the White House press corps to perform one of the oldest tricks in the
book: blaming Congress. He faulted lawmakers 16 times in his opening statement
alone.
"Americans are understandably anxious about issues affecting their pocketbook,"
he began, and "they're looking to their elected leaders in Congress for action."
Implicit in his formulation was that Americans no longer look to him for action.
"Congress has repeatedly blocked efforts," he protested. "Congress continues to
block provisions. . . . Congress needs to clear away obstacles. . . . Congress
is considering a massive, bloated farm bill. . . . Congress needs to do more. .
. . I ask Congress to do its part."
The reporters in the audience didn't fall for the blame-Congress
sleight-of-hand.
"Gas prices have gone up, foreclosures have gone up, there have been layoffs,
news just this morning that consumer confidence is down yet again," recited the
Associated Press's Jennifer Loven. "Isn't it time to think about doing more?"
"Were you premature in saying that the U.S. economy is not in a recession?"
needled Jeremy Pelofsky of Reuters.
"Americans believe we are in a recession," pointed out American Urban Radio's
April Ryan. "What will it take for you to say those words, that we are in a
recession?"

History will look at this awful Iraq war and note that it was started on a pack of lies, continued by the same and state that the only group who benefited from it, were the Halliburtons of the world and condemn the big bro 43 administration for this vile conflicts of interests.