is the Zed dead?

got a story about “Red Dawn”

Good morning.

“Red Dawn” had the most gratuitous use of gunfire ever produced in a hollywood production up to that time. Also the most gratuitous lack of plot (IMHO)

Lack of plot? Are you kidding? Cubans and Russians invading Nebraska!

Are you sayin’ that is a plot?, more like a wet-dream of a neocon most likely /s

By the way, the Georgian situation is being live blogged over at The Guardian for your edification

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/ne.....flict.html

Geez, one post about super shopper Condi and here we have super neocon Perle blessing us with his words of wisdom. What a pathetic pair. Condi is looking for shoes to boost her image in the mirror and Perle is still looking for Reds under his bed.

Hopefully, the mass killing has stopped in Georgia and Ossetia. We don’t have the Reds to worry about any more, just another empire. Whoever writes the definitive history of the Shrub administration should title it “The Years of Incompetence.”

Bloom County. The Widow Pickleby could have been the inspiration for the Earth Liberation Movement (ELF).

Emptywheel found this gem

July 15th, 2008~ 1200 US troops in Georgia start 3 week joint military exercise

That means that 1200 US troops along with over a hundred Pentagon Advisors and Military trainers were in Georgia on the eve of Georgia’s foray into South Ossetia. I suspect that it would be well nigh impossible for Georgia to have hid the planned operation from US military advisors. In addition, since a war games exercise would have interfered with their incursion unless it had been coordinated, I suspect that the Pentagon actually assisted the Georgians under the “cover” of a military exercise.

oh nice

I haven’t the link, but Israel is reported to have a “security contingent” there as well. I saw it on either BBC, The Guardian, or Timesonline.

Under this Dept of War nothing surprises me anymore. Just before WWII Stalin purged the military. After Shrub is gone we need to purge ours. These assholes never met a war they didn’t like.

Mornin’, Elliott

oh please, please let it wes clark. pretty please.

Probably true, since they get some of their oil from the pipeline that runs through Georgia. Saw a reference to that at TPM.

This is what The Guardian had reported as leading up to the latest outbreak of peace/s

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worl.....a.georgia1

Since we have completely institutionalized Milo Minderbender the profits just keep rolling in

Yeah, let’s militarize the D party with I-love-to-bomb Clark. We’ve militarized everything else in this country, why should the D party be exempt.

Mornin’, it’s so nice out here it’s hard to be getting any work done. Just the day to hang out laundry. Wish we could get the stain of BushCo out. Keeps spreading tho

Weird stuff out of the erstwhile Hillary Clinton “War Room”

Wolfson: “Edwards voters were OUR voters”

Howard Wolfson asserts that they would have won the Iowa caucuses if Edwards had withdrawn because of his infidelities. His point is debatable since most evidence is that Edwards supporters generally gravitated over to Obama rather than flocking to Hillary once Edwards DID drop out. But given this next little item…who’s to say that someone in the Clinton campaign DIDN’T contact the National Enquirer on the eve of Iowa?

“Attack Obama’s Patriotism” Clinton’s Chief Pollster Advised Yep! Dear old Mark Penn suggested that all trhey needed was one tape of Jeremiah Wright with Obama in the audience to slam-dunk the upstart. Funny, this might explain a lot about certain websites run by former CIA agents.

The first thing the next Secretary of War needs to do is start the dismantling of the privatization of the military. The taxpayers would save a bundle and military logistics would be more efficient. Barnacle started that crap and I’d love to break this one off in his ass. Barnacle’s big coup gone with the stroke of a pen.

It’s good to know that Bush is always there to protect us from the S. Ossetians…wha? If only we had a media that cared about reporting Republican fascism and not be part and parcel to it. Looks as If we only have God to save us…surely there are no liberals with enough guts to oppose Republican fascism..wo is us.

I can’t believe that after all that has happened lo these nearly eight years of pure hell that people are still falling for Washington Junta’s most obvious dirty tricks.

Washington is responsible for goading Georgia into this blitzkrieg against South Ossetia. They are the aggressors in this conflict. Russia is trying to staunch the carnage launched with the approval and encouragement of the Washington Junta.

As usual, everything is topsy-turvy in the western press and western diplomatic statements.

Nevertheless, Europe is quietly taking up the rôle of impartial arbitrator without the U.S. The U.S. is regarded by them as too partisan in the matter.

Once again, Washington has blood on its hands in its never-ending pursuit of oil access.

How dare you suggest that. Our Sec. of State is a Russia, err, Soviet expert. She would never misunderestimate them.

They also never met a war that included the service of their own family members. Yet, no one ever asks them why that is.

Yes but she had much more important things on her agenda. Spending money on shoes has got to be a priority.

More from McClatchy on what the US/military knew and didn’t know about the Geogian plans to try to recontrol South Ossetia.

Didn’t she scowl at them already? Since that’s her usual approach, she’s free now to shop.

As usual, everything is topsy-turvy in the western press and western diplomatic statements.

They’d much rather trip over themselves getting the “scoop” on John Edwards’ infidelity…

Off to swim in the great capitalist cesspool.

And to think of ways to keep the Rethugs’ incompetence during the last 12 or so years in the public eye, particularly of the last 8 years.

Be good to yourselves, and all other living things.

Namaste

Working title, Condi Bio -

Dressing Up, Sucking Up, F**king Up and Bailing Out:

The Role of Untethered Ambition in Academia, the Private Sector and “Public Service”

It is also so much easier to get handed their story lines by the WH press corpse than to actually dig for what is going on

Forgot blaming others

The delicacy of the situation was underscored by the U.S. decision to leave its military advisers in Georgia, though, with Georgia’s troops no longer in Iraq, there was little for the advisers to do.

it always starts with the military advisers

yep, yep, yep.

I rarely watch the networks’ news, but caught NBC last night–Tom Brokaw completely glossed over the Chinese gov’t installing surveillance cameras at every turn–even in hotels–to control any dissidents, including foreign journalists.

If you’ve read Naomi Klein’s piece, you know that she had been blocked from human rights websites and had limited access to news organizations while in China.

Drive by on the way out the door.

I vaguely remember another useless war that started with military advisors in the field.

yes, vaguely you remember that one.

Namaste

Here is another interesting article-

possible mercenaries in the Georgian military

But why would these folks be wearing ANY US military insignia befuddles me. I doubt that such insignia would protect them, nor do I think that the Pentagon would “claim” them. However if the Russians happened to kill several US military advisors by bombing Georgian bases outside of South Ossetia.

will this BushCo nightmare never end?

or the John Edwards’ never ending tabloid bonanza, upstairs

It’s good to see that people here are at least using caution in weighing the situation there and Washington’s involvement.

If there’s a single US soldier or “mercenary” found among the Georgian troops, . . .

There have been captives reported in Izvestia, including African-Americans. Some fatalities reported. Link.

Why do I think that this is just so much unadulterated bulldada?

“Pentagon officials said that despite having 130 trainers assigned to Georgia, they had no advance notice of Georgia’s sudden move last Thursday to send thousands of Georgian troops into South Ossetia to capture that province’s capital, Tskhinvali.

Not only did the U.S. troops working alongside their Georgian counterparts not see any signs of an impending invasion, Georgian officials did not notify the U.S. military before the incursion, a senior U.S. defense official told McClatchy.”

Note that they don’t even bother to mention that Operation “Immediate Response 2008″ war games ended on the eve of the Georgian push into S. Ossetia, but they don’t mention that several high ranking US generals were on the scene observing these operations.

Again, why would the Georgians plan an operation like the move into South Ossetia while distracted by an unrelated “war games” exercise and with the US right there with full surveillance in force. Unless the war-games were coordinated (requiring US cooperation) with the Ossetian operation the Georgians would have postponed it. My suspicion is that the US played some role in this, at the very least monitoring Russian actions, using Immediate Response 2008 as a cover. The Georgians used the “War Games” to cover their deployments to the North.

The move into South Ossetia occurred just as “Immediate Response” ended (Thursday). It’s likely that many US personnel were still on the ground dealing with “logistics” (ahem).

Is it feasible that Shaashkivili would have done this without telling the Americans? That the US didn’t notice odd movements during the “war games” unrelated to the operation.

No…it was coordinated!

Shaashkivili was schooled in Washington, D.C.

Yeah. It’s a case of “be careful what you reward.” I was horrified to hear that firefighting in California has been highly privatized. how dumb is that?

Is there a link to an English language version?

No, there isn’t. You can get a sense of it using babelfish.altavista.com. Remember altavista.com? : It’s got Yahoo! written all over it now. Bill Gates is still keen on acquiring that, as well.

Cubans and Russians invading Nebraska!

It was Colorado, though I believe the movie was actually filmed in New Mexico.

WOLVERINES!!!!!!

not nearly as good as the one filmed in maine.

The one with Brian Keith and Alan Arkin (of Second City fame).

Very good article on McCain’s response to the Georgia/Russia conflict:

If anyone has any doubt McCain would be a disaster as president and worse than W…(I know, I’m preaching to the choir.)

http://www.belgraviadispatch.c.....eless.html

NPR reported this morning there was a rally in Tbilisi I believe where thousands of people gathered in support of their president and in defiance of Russia.

Wasn’t Obama heard saying the Blackwater had gotten a bad rap?

Not sure we can assume an Obama administration will drop using private military contractors.