Salon.com News | Why are these people smiling?

With war underway, and a Bush victory a possibility, the antiwar movement appears to be in denial about its future influence.

When Bush “won” the election, I heard smart lefties assuring each other that things wouldn’t look so great for the republicans come mid-term elections.

It smelled like hubris to me at the time, and it was no surprise (to me, at least) that the mid-term elections worked out pretty well for the right. Of course, those smart lefties couldn’t have foreseen 9/11 (though many of them also argue that 9/11 was the inevitable outcome of American imperialism), but thats really part of my point. Don’t get cocky, you never know whats going to happen to upset your complacency.

I can’t really say what the general mood is of the Anti-war movement, since I don’t have much to do with it, but they certainly seem to be in their own world to me. Perhaps though, they have already surrendered influence for the next 2-10 years (whether they know it or not) and are instead massing for later battles.

Whatever is going on, I find it troubling. I don’t know what the answer is, but I do know that we need credible opposition to Bush & his gang in the near term.

Where is Raed ?

Now that was really unexpected. When the sirens went on we thought we will get bombs by the tom load dropped on us but nothing happened, at least in the part of the city where I lived. Air-craft guns could be heard for a while but they stopped too after a while and then the all clear siren came.

Interesting blog from Baghdad.

Turkey Shoot – How Bush made enemies of our allies. By Paul Glastris

Of course, we’ll never know the answer to these questions. History doesn’t do controlled experiments. But we do know that George H.W. Bush worked sincerely and energetically to put together an international war coalition and succeeded; Bill Clinton worked sincerely and energetically to put together an international war coalition and succeeded; and George W. Bush worked grudgingly and sporadically to do the same and failed.

Excellent article putting the failed international leadership of George Bush Jr into perspective.

Salon.com | See no evil

The antiwar left does not mount massive protests against China, Pakistan or Egypt. Millions do not pour into the streets on behalf of the student-led democracy movement in Iran. And Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden are not angrily compared to Hitler — that treatment is more often reserved for George W. Bush.

This seems to be true, and it has been bothering me.

seattlepi.com: Photo Journal
I saw this photo yesterday in a newspaper machine. I was struck by how hard this woman was to miss. She was directly in front of the bulldozer, yelling into a bullhorn, wearing a bright red jacket with reflective tape.

But then, I guess the bulldozer driver didn’t miss her, did he? He ran her right over and killed her. Perhaps the driver was distracted by the extremely dangerous looking caucasian dancing to the ska-band-in-his head in front of him. Or perhaps he was distracted by the camera, worried that it would catch him in an atrocity?

I’m going to remember this picture whenever I hear that the Isralies have “accidentally” killed another palestinian while razing a compound.

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