Needlenose

Could President Obama actually be prepared to hold firm to some position this time in his upcoming round of negotiations with the Congressionals?  Or is he some sort of Republican Manchurian Candidate who will just appear to have some sort of plan or convictions and then cave in on demands to cut social programs (as he did recently with the Bush Tax Cuts for the Wealthy)?  What with extending warrantless wiretapping, keeping Gitmo afloat, ‘surging’ troops in Afghanistan and keeping a sizeable number of troops in Iraq, Obama seems to be hell-bent on keeping the Bush Legacy alive!

*Update* California is a crazy bi-partisan microcosm of the Great American Stalemate.  However, under Jerry Brown’s stern governance, we’ve somehow managed to move forward on a budget before our bonds became Junk.  That’s a mixed omen, with a ray of light indicating that budget deals are possible, however the budget was largely an exercise in painful cuts to education and social services.  It wasn’t all bad, though, as it seems like Jerry was still able to piss off a few Reactionaries – some of the more radical counties want to split and form their own Hicksylvania.  I’d be all for it were it not for the creation of two more Repug Senators.

North Korean soldier looking for Repair_Man_Jack's house

…no, just seriously stoopid.  I’ve noticed that of late, as the HuffPos and PajamaMedias of the blogosphere emerge, fewer and fewer people ‘cross over’ to visit blogs and media of the opposing camp.  With all this Tea Party noise about the deficit, I thought I’d take a peak at one of the bigger conservative blogs to see what they had to say about it, and perhaps, as a self-professed ‘balanced budget’ guy, I might find some common ground.

Quite randomly, I found this diatribe by Repair_Man_Jack on RedState with the premise that we can’t cut the U.S. Defense budget without increasing security risk.  The crux of his argument is that there are some potential flashpoints out there such as the Korean Penninsula and the recent Chinese military buildup, and that we need to keep the sea lanes open for trade.

I’m guessing Repair_Man_Jack hasn’t really his homework if he thinks all of the defense budget goes to the cordon sanitaire around N. Korea and into policing the sea lanes.  I can think of many potential cuts that we can take immediately to tip the scales back in the direction of balance.

First, what are we paying per year for Shrubya’s occupations of Iraq & Afghanistan and other misc overseas adventures?  Something like $171 Billion a year….that’s a lot of scratch!  Presumably Jack the Repair Man is still a Believer in these invasions, otherwise undoubtedly he would have seen the Elephant in the budget room.

Then there is Shrubya’s unproven ‘Missile Defense” program, a costly $18B/year!!  Beyond the fact that what few tests that have been conducted have had extremely dubious results, I’m hard-pressed to understand exactly what threat this is supposed to protect us  from – the North Korean missiles might have the range now, but their guidance is questionable.  If either China or Russia get pissed at us and decide to send missiles our way, most likely those would come out of subs off the coast, a ‘use case’ not covered by Shrubya’s Star Wars.

And what of the $8+ Billion a year we are paying to support our nuclear weapons program?  Weren’t we supposed to be decreasing the number of bombs in our stockpile? ConservObama is not just continuing Shrubya’s handouts to aerospace in this filthy industry, but actually increasing the size of the defense and energy budget to support nuclear weapons and nuclear power research.  We haven’t hit the point where the US can get rid of all our stockpile and do no further maintenance, but seriously, how many H-Bomb-equipped MIRVs do we need to wipe out N. Korea, China and Iran?  Let’s close down one of the weapons lab and pare the remaining one back to a core function of reducing our stockpile further, and maintaining a enough weapons to wipe out Jack the Repairman’s overblown threats abroad.

Anyway, I’ll spare you further commentary, just take a look at this list of astronomical military boondoggles if you want to find another trillion or so (over time) in defense spending cuts that we can safely make without provoking a N. Korean invasion of the Fatherland.

As for Repair_Man_Jack, I suggest you stick to repairing drywall.

Barbara O’Brien of Mahablog fame asked to post on Needlenose.  Happy to post anything that bashes Confederates, particulary of the reactionary persuasion, so here goes:

Recently I wrote here that Mississippi has the worst health care in the nation. Now I want to tell the story about how desperate Mississippians, abandoned by their government, turned to Iran for help.

Bt first, I want to tell you about Mississippi’s infant mortality rate. The rate of infant mortality is the number of infants who are born alive but die before their first birthday, per 1,000 live births. In other words, if infant mortality is 5, that means that 5 of every 1,000 babies in that population will not survive the first year of life.

According to the CIA World Factbook, the estimated infant mortality rate in the United States for 2009 is 6.22, which is high for an industrialized democracy. But according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the infant mortality rate in Mississippi is 11.4. Only Florida is worse, at 14.1. By contrast, the infant mortality rate for Washington and Minnesota is 5.1.

Now, here’s where Iran comes in — according to the Times of London, last October “five top Iranian doctors, including a senior official at the health ministry in Tehran, were quietly brought to Mississippi” to advise Mississippians how to lower their infant mortality rate.

This exchange came about when James Miller, managing director of Oxford International Development Group, was consulting in a rural Mississippi hospital. “He was shocked to find that the state had the third highest medical expenditure per capita, but came last in terms of outcome,” the Times article said.

Miller remembered a conference presentation on how Iran radically lowered its infant mortality rates. Facing a shortage of doctors and hospitals, the government launched a program of “health houses” staffed by local people trained to be health workers. The health workers are authorized to provide basic medical services such as diabetes monitoring as well as prenatal and obstetric care. Infant and maternal mortality rates both fell dramatically as a result.

James Miller contacted Iranian doctors to find out if their program might be applied to Mississippi. So the Iranian doctors came to Mississippi to give advice. Although the idea of following an Iranian model was a hard sell in Mississippi, at least one community has begun work on an Iranian style “health house” to provide better care for pregnant women abandoned by Mississippi’s health care system.

Dr Aaron Shirley, who worked with James Miller on the Iranian project, admitted they were staying under the radar. Mississippi government officials, including Governor Haley Barbour, were not involved or informed.

This takes us back to the issue identified in the earlier post — Mississippi has the worst health care in the nation, but as far as Gov. Barbour is concerned, this is not a problem. The governor is perfectly clear, on his website and in public pronouncements, that Mississippi fixed its health care problems by passing a comprehensive tort reform bill in 2004. The 2004 law affected all kinds of personal injury lawsuits in Mississippi.

In the U.S., state after state has passed “tort reform” laws that make it harder for citizens to file personal injury suits and also limit the amount of damages they can receive. This is a critical issue for people with asbestos-related disease such as mesothelioma cancer, who so often need damage awards to care for themselves and their families. “Tort reform” also is being pushed by conservatives nationwide as the way to fix the nation’s health care crisis.

But Mississippi reformed tort in 2004, and it still has the worst health care in the nation. What did Governor Barbour “fix,” exactly?

-Barbara O’Brien

Guest post from Spy Buddy:

Kazakhstan is now heading up the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) for 2010, which is ironic since the Associated Press has reported Kazakhstan has almost concluded a deal with Iran to export 1,350 tons of purified uranium ore .

States from Europe, Central Asia and North America to form the largest regional security organization in the
world.  According to the OSCE’s website, that Organization addresses a wide range of security-related issues such as military and human rights.  And we all know that Iran has been determined a rogue state due to its political and military policies (i.e. building nuclear weapons and holding fraudulent elections) and continues its poor human rights records with ordering death sentences to the opposition party as well as raping, torturing and murdering rounded up protesters.

While its chilling to think Iran getting hold of so much uranium its even worse seeing Kazakhstan leading the OSCE since its does little to uphold the organization’s charter. Kazakhstan is ranked 142 out of 174 by
Reporters Without Borders.  Just recently the government jailed Yevgeny Zhovtis-a prominent human rights activist, and in December Gennady Pavlyuk, a Kyrgyz opposition journalist, was apparently
thrown from the sixth-floor window of an apartment with his hands and feet bound with duct tape.

I now understand why Sacha Baron Cohen selected Kazakhstan as the home nation for Borat.

I guess defenestration is making a comeback!

From the Huffington Post liveblogging of the Iranian Revolution in progress, 1:59 PM ET — “Death to Russia!”:

“Traditionally, there’s this guy at the Friday prayers whom people mockingly call ‘vazireh shoaar’, or the minister of slogans. His job is to shout slogans through loudspeakers and lead the crowd to chant death to America or Israel or whoever after him. In this clip you hear the crowd going flatly against him as he desperately cycles through the usual slogans (death to America, death to Israel, death to England and so on), and regardless of what he shouts, the crowd keeps repeating one chant: ‘marg bar roosiyeh’ (Death to Russia) !!”

Isn’t it great to hear a crowd in the Middle East chanting “Death to…” somebody else for a change?

Juan Cole marks today as a critical milestone in the Iraq War, the beginning of the end of the conflict.  He points out a number of issues and potential actions that could bedevil the withdrawal, from a potential uptick in car bombings to Iranian meddling.

I was concerned as far back as November 2003 that there were elements within Iraq that would like to keep us around and might carry out actions that would make it difficult or impossible for us to leave.

So far it seems that most of the continuing internecine bloodbath is focused around the Kurdistan/Islamic Republic of Iraq divide in ‘swing’ cities Mosul and Kirkuk.  I think the Shi’ites and Kurds will find common cause at some point and that won’t be an impediment to withdrawal.

I don’t think Iranian meddling will be as much of an issue – if the Mullah government doesn’t fall to the Green Revolution, it will certainly be bloodied, and much less inclined to meddle in Iraqi affairs.

So the real question I think will be the Sunni/Shi’ite divide and how soon and to what extent it intensifies.

Again via the indefatigable Nico Pitney, a report from Iran’s official (!) PressTV news agency:

Iran’s Guardian Council has admitted that the number of votes collected in 50 cities surpass the number of the people eligible to cast ballot in those areas.

The council’s Spokesman Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei, who was speaking on the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) Channel 2 on Sunday, made the remarks in response to complaints filed by Mohsen Rezaei — a defeated candidate in the June 12 Presidential election.

“Statistics provided by Mohsen Rezaei in which he claims more than 100% of those eligible have cast their ballot in 170 cities are not accurate — the incident has happened in only 50 cities,” Kadkhodaei said.

The spokesman, however, said that although the vote tally affected by such an irregularity is over 3 million, “it has yet to be determined whether the amount is decisive in the election results” . . .

Hey, so there were at least a few million votes’ worth of fraud — but let’s not jump to the conclusion that it’s any kind of big deal! Somewhere, Antonin Scalia is smiling…

Via Nico Pitney’s indispensable liveblog at the Huffington Post, President Obama has edged a bit further off the sidelines regarding the Iranian post-election protests:

I’m very concerned — based on some of the tenor and tone of the statements that have been made – that the government of Iran recognize that the world is watching. And how they approach and deal with people who are, through peaceful means, trying to be heard will, I think, send a pretty clear signal to the international community about what Iran is and — and is not.

Meanwhile, the immense crowds that have been gathering daily in Tehran and the authoritarian regime they’re protesting against continue to watch each other, waiting to see who will blink first.

Despite threats from “supreme leader” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei of violence in response to further demonstrations, messages of continuing resistance are being passed along via new media (thanks, Attackerman) and word of mouth.

The mood of the protesters seems to be both courageous and fatalistic.  Anecdotes cited in Nico Pitney’s liveblog and elsewhere on HuffPo reveal individuals uncertain of their chances of success — or even survival — and not viewing Mousavi as a savior, but nonetheless recognizing what may be a singular opportunity to affirm that the voice of the people matters in their country.

The government’s reluctance so far to respond with a direct crackdown is explained by Jon Lee Anderson in the New Yorker:

Thirty years ago, during the demonstrations that led to the Shah’s downfall, one of the dominant images was scenes of uniformed soldiers firing live ammunition at protesters. This week, Iran’s clerics seem determined, at least, not to repeat that historic mistake. They remember that the daily news coverage of the Shah’s soldiers shooting and killing unarmed protesters precipitated the collapse of the regime.

The regime’s attempt to quell the dissent has thus been limited to the work of shadowy plainclothes militias, whose thuggery appears to have been met in some instances with reverse vigilantism.

In this context, Obama’s reminder that “the world is watching” is timely and important as a way of (hopefully) deterring wider bloodshed.

(Cross-posted at Firedoglake.)

Iran, surrounded by U.S. military bases (indicated by flags)

You know there’s trouble brewing when stories about intensely contested campaigns begin with this (from the BBC):

The two main candidates in Iran’s presidential election have claimed victory, after extended voting as huge numbers of people turned out to vote.

Reformist challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi told a news conference that he had won by a substantial margin.

However, state media said hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had won, and officials said he had got 69% of the five million votes so far counted.

The touting of a big Ahmedinejad lead in the preliminary official tabulations seems to have come in response to Mousavi’s public claim of victory, as Al Arabiya reports:

Meanwhile Ahmadinejad’s supporters refuted such statements as “false” and intended as psychological warfare to affect voter turnout.

“These early statements are meant to influence votes,” Ali Akbar Javanfekr, advisor to Ahmadinejad, told Al Arabiya.

Of course, if that’s what the president’s supporters think, it kind of tips their hand about their proclamations, too, doesn’t it?

Amid the premature and conflicting claims, it’s hard to tell what the truth is yet.  The well-documented massive urban demonstrations for Mousavi, the main challenger to Ahmedinejad, in contrast with the Iranian regime’s authoritarian nature, have led to predictions such as this from the Times of London:

It is widely believed that the 2005 election was marred by fraud and experts estimate that up to four million votes could be rigged this year. However, with the turnout so high, even that may not be enough.

The wide media coverage given to the protests, though, could be misleading.  Because opposition to Ahmedinejad is concentrated among the most urban, educated and affluent voters — the ones who are easiest for foreign journalists to come in contact with — Mousavi’s support may be overstated in the media.

At the same time, when Iranian press agencies are reporting (via the Al Arabiya story linked above) that “participation in Iranian villages reached 90 percent,” it’s reasonable to be suspicious that not all of those votes are legitimate.

Attackerman and Talking Points Memo have been providing analyis of the Iranian elections throughout the day, so check there (as well as more obvious news sources like CNN) for updates as the situation evolves (or devolves).

(Cross-posted at Firedoglake.)

P.S.  Special inside joke for Michael Ledeen fans: The dead are voting!

Over at American Footprints, new contributor Motown67 summarizes a report by the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point on Iran’s actions related to the U.S. occupation of Iraq.  For an institution connected to the U.S. military, the CTC is surprisingly clear-eyed in seeing the comprehensive, multiple-choice strategy Iran has followed in Iraq.  As Motown67 puts it in his condensed take:

[Iran has backed] a variety of groups from the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council (SIIC), to the Dawa Party to Moqtada al-Sadr to Special Groups even though they are opposed to each other. Iran supported the Americans at first as well, because the creation of a new political system was the vehicle for Iran’s allies to gain power in the new government. At the same time, Iran began reaching out to Sadr and Shiite militants.

. . . Tehran believed that elections would allow its allies to gain power. The SIIC and Dawa had already positioned themselves before the invasion as exile groups willing to work with the U.S. At the same time, Iran began a dual track policy of infiltrating thousands of Badr Brigade fighters into Iraq, supported by the Qods Force. They also had Hezbollah send some operatives to work within the country. They eliminated opponents of Iran and set up operations against the U.S.

Most crucially, the CTC notes that rather than being closely allied with Sadr (as Bushite rhetoric has falsely insisted), the Iranians used financial/military support of breakaway militants to undermine his standing in Iraq:

The fracturing of the Sadr Trend suited Iran. They disliked Sadr’s political moves because he continued to be a nationalist and anti-Iranian, and was a wild card. He could stop or start military actions when Iran didn’t want him to, which would harm Tehran’s larger political policy. The Special Groups on the other hand, were committed to fighting the occupation using violence, so Iran began moving towards them. They could be regulated by the amount of lethal aid Iran provided them.

Funding violence by former Sadrists served a double purpose — simultaneously pressuring the U.S. occupation and chipping away at Sadr’s authority, allowing SIIC and Dawa (Tehran’s longer-term allies) to reap the benefits without leaving any fingerprints.  All in a good scam‘s work, you might say.