The full 30-minute movie can be watched and downloaded (in WMV, DivX AVI or Flash format) at:

http://nk007movie.googlepages.com/

I even have a nascent theory I’m trying to decide whether I like on why the Puppet Master theme is so powerful – the shorter version of which is that people don’t WANT to (or can’t) believe that the Preznit of the US could possibly be responsible for such moronity in their name in every aspect of governance/leadership, so they look to place the blame elsewhere. And they find comfort, cold that it may be, that the real immoral moron responsible wasn’t really “elected,” but usurped the office

Looking elsewhere? Absolutely. At Scott Peterson, dead celebrities, runaway brides. Trying to deal with the feeling that a great crime has been/is being committed, and if we only catch/convict the guilty (Lyndie England) and save the innocent (Jessica Lynch), we can go back to thinking of ourselves as the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.

There’s something in this mix that has been troubling me here for some time. Follow me on this:

Iran’s oil is state-owned. Even if we whack Iran substantially, it’s doubtful that would change. Big Oink – er, Oil – has just managed to coerce the best sweetheart deal for oil production with the current government in Iraq: this before that country even has working infrastructure in any meaningful form. Iran’s oil mostly goes to China and Russia: should it become unavailable it is unlikely Big Oil would miss it domestically – or at least defensible that they should think so.

Bush is facing increasing resistance to the use of troops in engaging Iran. But that’s hardly his only weapon. Two (or is it three) CVN’s in the Persian Gulf, packed with weapons, and almost certainly augmented by an SSBN or two, present a far more credible potential option and a significantly greater threat than any number of boots on the ground while substantially reducing the risk to troops in-theatre.

Thus, Big Oil’s thirst is now glutted with profitable Iraqi oil, making Iran’s oilfields effectively redundant. Meanwhile, public outcry about the hardships faced by troops and veterans will certainly bear on the planning for any Iran conflict.

Faced with these two conditions, the likelihood that Bush’s [counter]strike would be nuclear – and powerful enough to essentially depopulate Iran completely – are substantially increased. And the fact that Russia (whose nukes are drastically reduced and somewhat deteriorated by now) and China (whose nuclear arsenal is comparatively small) would take issue with this approach isn’t factored into the equation: in part because the [mal]administration’s perception that this is a battle of ideologies still appears to hold sway at the White House, and in part because foreign opinion seems not to matter to this same executive. It’s conceivable that Bush could even try to sell nuking all of Iran in terms of human-capital cost-benefit: if we “win” that engagement “without loss of American lives” he’d no doubt see that as a plus.

Late to the party, and I may have missed something due to a crushing work load. Did I hear right that these Iranian weapons found in Iraq had a big ol’ “Made In Iraq” stamp on them…in English?

WTF? Why would they stamp them in English, the language of the great Satan? Smells funny to me.

OFG, I don’t think the English lettering is quite as suspicious as it seems at first glance. English is pretty much the standard language of commerce these days, and the Iranians export these weapons. In fact, while looking at this, I ran across a Human Rights Watch report about the Iranians selling mortars to Guinea. Guinea then turned them over to a revolutionary group by the acronym of LURD (don’t know what that stands for), which was determined to destabilize the government of nearby Liberia. They used them to attack Liberian troops, who then replied with, you guessed it, mortars purchased from Iran. The only way they could determine who was lobbing what at whom was the relative sizes of the mortars used.

This only goes to show that the weapons presented as evidence were as likely acquired somewhere along the export chain–either through the black market aided by theft in Iran, through independent arms dealers, arms smugglers or resale by countries who bought them and then resold them at great profit because of the demand in Iraq.

Could have been acquired from a dozen different sources that had nothing to do with decisions made by the ayatollahs in Iran….

“If it was right to give the Jewish people a homeland in 1948, why is not right today to give the Palestinians a homeland?”

Unless I’m misunderstanding you, the implication is that the Jewish people, given what they experienced prior to 1948, should have made them sympathetic of a goal or need shared with Palestinians. To us, the answer to your question is obvious. But, the experience of the Holocaust, which I cannot imagine, followed by post war anti-semitism in Europe, in other words, a massively traumatized people, creates profound psychological wounds which to this day are not healed. I believe we’re seeing the reverberations of these traumas vis-a-vis Iran and in the rhetoric of Ahmadinejad. I found a book at a research library @ Pacifica Graduate Institute which helped me begin to understand the psychological dynamics of massively traumatized peoples: “International Handbook of Multigenerational Legacies of Trauma.”

OK kiddo, I don’t have a link but Russia, China, and India met recently on the matter of joining forces to counter US power and creating a “multi-polar” world. (I think that was the term used.)

WTF? Why would they stamp them in English, the language of the great Satan? Smells funny to me.

we now have trade agreements with iraq
a kindof long article:
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0924-13.htm

Linda2 @ 129

The operative words as I see it are “think they’re protecting Israel”. Heck, losing a reputation is a whole different thing than risking physical destruction. You know, the old “sticks and stones” thing. There is no logical way to compare the power potential of the United States and Israel. It seems symbiotic, but Israel just happens to be in the region where the most important future economic and strategic American “interests” are being fought over. Also, consider that Israel is the logical surrogate (or proxy) because it is uniquely different than all of the other countries in the region by history and culture.

In some ways, the projection of power potential of Israel in the region and US in the world are comparable. In terms of numbers of warheads, Israel may now be the fourth- or fifth-largest nuclear power in the world. That’s a massively disproportionate strength in their region, and it can cause them to behave in the same irrational ways as the US under Bush. (!)

Loss of reputation can be just as destructive as land warfare (maybe more so). What happens if trade embargoes are leveled at the US (or Israel) because of the general bellicosity of the two? If there were a general embargo against Israeli arms sales in the world, its economy would collapse (frightening statistic I heard recently–one in four people are dependent upon the Israeli military, defense procurement and arms exports for their livelihoods).

I guess what I’m suggesting is that if there’s any eventual damage accruing to Israel, it’s will not be because of the US’s cynical manipulation of Israel as a regional proxy, but, rather, because of the unwittingly cooperative efforts of the two governments.

Okay. I agree, let’s say there could be an “unwittingly” cooperative effort of the two governments – I just think they have two separate agendas.

#1. I (personally) don’t believe anybody is going to nuke anybody. If they do, Sayonara Baby, what can I say. People are too greedy and too addicted to money and lifestyle (even this admin.) to risk that. We, who spent our childhood with our heads under our desks every day during the Cuban crisis, are beginning to come to terms with that. None of us would have thought that we would have grown up to be as old as we are now. That includes George W. who– I am sure has no death wish – no way (no matter what sh.. he spews).

#2. As far as trade embargos on us…the U.S. would just print more money. We own the printers. They hate to admit that, but truth is, they just print more money when they need it. It is true. Yes it is. It is too.

we now have trade agreements with iraq
a kindof long article:
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0924-13.htm