The US Commerce Department said Friday that Gross Domestic Product, the broadest measure of economic output, grew by only 2.2 percent in the fourth quarter of last year, down from an earlier estimate of 2.6 percent and a sharp fall from earlier quarters.
This followed the announcement by the Labor Department on Thursday that consumer prices fell by 0.7 percent, the largest fall since December 2008. Over the past 12 months, prices have fallen by 0.1 percent, the first annual deflation figure posted since October 2009.
These figures belie official claims that the US is an economically healthy counterbalance to the overall slump and deflation that now encompasses most of the world. In fact, US economic growth, hampered by an enormous impoverishment of the working class in the years following the financial crisis, remains far below previous historical averages.
On Tuesday, Standard and Poor’s said that its Case-Shiller Index showed that home prices grew by 4.6 percent over the past year, the slowest housing price increase since 2011. “The housing recovery is faltering,” David Blitzer, chairman of the index committee at S&P Dow Jones, told the Los Angeles Times. “Before the recession, anytime housing starts were at their current level… the economy was in a recession.”
Meanwhile the number of people in the US newly filing for jobless benefits jumped by 31,000 to 313,000 last week, in the largest increase since December 2013, reflecting a series of mass layoffs and business closures announced this month.
Over six years now, U.S. President Barack Obama has had to fix the economy.
And he still has not fixed it.
He has failed at that.
More than anything else, the economy failure will haunt him.
He will be remembered as the one who refused to create needed new jobs.
And all the spin that his Cult would love to offer will fall by the wayside as the find other politicians to whore for once Mr. Obama is out of the White House.
This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for today:
Saturday, February 28, 2015. Chaos and violence continue, a lot of gabbing over the attack on the Mosul Museum but not any real analysis, Barack's desire for combat troops gathers more attention, is the Islamic State just desperate for more press or are they carrying out large acts as part of a farewell to Mosul, and much more
A friend who's a TV actress can talk Iraq every few months. Whenever there's a story, for example, about how zoo animals are hunted in Iraq, she's all over it. She's outraged. She's angry. Her speech can go on for 90 minutes -- and it is a speech, it's not a conversation.
And I guess I should be grateful that in a world of apathy -- in the United States of Apathy -- she thinks passionately about Iraq at all.
But, no offense to the big game animals, I'm really more concerned with human life in Iraq. I didn't notice, for example, anyone getting upset about the slaughter when new buildings or US outposts in Iraq were accompanied by the ritualistic slaughter/sacrifice of an animal.
I bring this up because in Thursday's snapshot we quoted the Metropolitan Museum on the attack on the Mosul Museum.
We could have quoted any number of organizations or what have you. To me, however, if it's a museum that's attacked, let's listen to what another museum is saying. And I think it's valid for museums around the world to issue statements.
But there's valid and then there's questionable.
A.R. Williams (National Geographic) reports:
Islamic State militants released a video on Thursday showing the destruction of priceless antiquities in northern Iraq.
Running for more than five minutes, the video records men toppling statues in a museum and smashing them with sledgehammers, and attacking other statues at an archaeological site with a jackhammer.
And I think about it and, yeah, this is something National Geographic should be on, it's their reporting beat. The Guardian carries a column by Haifa Zangana which notes:
Earlier attacks on Mosul’s heritage by Isis targeted the tomb of Nabi Yunus (the prophet Jonah), and the grave of Abu al-Hassan al-Jazari, a 12th- and 13th-century historiographer known as ibn al-Athir.
The destruction of Mosul’s history is a crime against people who are proud of their education and heritage, and fully aware of the value, for example, of the library of Ashurbanipal, King of Assyria (668-627BC), with its 22,000 cuneiform tablets. Destruction of monuments that have been preserved through 14 centuries of Islam in Iraq is widely abhorred. These actions can be likened to the barbarism of an extreme sect in early Islam that demolished the shrine in Mecca.
And there's no question Iraqi novelist Haifa should be weighing in. But Pravada's got a report that opens, "Islamic State has committed yet another atrocity, adding vandalism and desecration of world cultural heritage to its list of crimes. UNESCO has expressed outrage over the attack on Mosul Museum and the destruction of statues and other artefacts, and has called for an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council." And AFP's report notes, "Archaeologists and heritage experts called for urgent action to protect the remains of some of oldest civilisations in the world." BBC offers, "The reported destruction of the statues follows recent reports that IS burnt down Mosul Library, which housed over 8,000 ancient manuscripts." And CNN has filed multiple stories including this one.
And we could go on and on with all the outlets filing stories.
But here's the thing, I can remember when Nouri used his Minister of the Interior to go after Iraq's LGBT and Emo and suspected LGBT and Emo communities.
And I can remember the reality -- not spin, not rumors -- of the violent deaths by stoning (often with bricks) or super-gluing the anuses, etc.
And I can remember the US press and the world press ignoring it for weeks and weeks.
I can remember getting traction with friends in the music press (including one who got a deal that I would stop slamming him if his publication tackled the story) and how even that took forever and took a mountain of work.
I love books, I love art, I love film and music but I don't think I value art more than I value human life.
But I'm not sure our modern press can say the same.
Forget the LGBT issue for a moment, it's also true 2010 through 2014 saw a vicious government assault on the Sunnis in Iraq and very few wanted to report on it. Some, like Patrick Cockburn, did so begrudgingly and minimized while 'covering' it. (Which is why Patrick Cockburn's reputation is so awful in the Arab world.)
I'm an artist. I believe in art. But I believe we can and do create new art every day. And if you told me a ship was sinking and we could save five people or save Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa which was also on the ship for some reason, I'd say save the five people.
That's not me calling art or culture disposable but it is me noting that people are needed for art: they're needed to appreciate it, they're needed for it to have value.
So it bothers me that when people are being killed by their own government, the world press is happy to take a pass.. But some objects being destroyed gets the attention of the entire world press.
I love animals, I love art. I just question the priorities of a global press which repeatedly finds ways to be outraged over something other than the deliberate killing of people.
Nearly fifteen months of daily bombings of civilian areas in Iraq -- in Sunni dominate Falluja -- by the Iraqi military -- bombings that have wounded and killed thousands -- has, in nearly fifteen months, received not even 1/4 of the coverage the attack on the Mosul Museum has received in 48 hours.
Again, I question the priorities of the global press.
For decades, the joke was that UPI was the Ethel Mertz of the global press. These days Ethel Mertz seems quite a bit loftier than any press outlet.
(That reputation preceded the Unification Church's purchase of UPI -- preceded it by decades. Ethel Mertz is the character Vivian Vance played on I Love Lucy, a character who always enjoyed sharing a juicy tidbit with Lucille Ball's Lucy Ricardo.)
The priorities seem skewed at best. Like with this [PDF format warning] report by alleged friends like Minority Rights Group International and Unrepresented Nations & Peoples Organization. The report supposedly is concerned with War Crimes in Iraq. I'm supposed to be using this site to promote it.
The fact that I was being asked (strong-armed) into promoting the Friday briefing that the report would be released at while at the same time not being able to see the report myself ahead of time was enough to set my 'Spidey sense' tingling and I said no.
And I've now read the report and I'm glad I said no.
Is that a report?
Because it reads like a cry for war.
I also don't get the bravery or the need to call out the Islamic State.
What's next? An emergency press release announcing Adolf Hitler was evil?
Watch this: Adolf Hitler should burn in hell!
Do you know I will probably not get one e-mail complaining about that statement.
It takes no courage to call out Adolf Hitler.
It also takes no courage -- if you're outside of Iraq or Syria -- to call out the Islamic State.
But a worthless report of 38 pages goes on and on about War Crimes carried out by the Islamic State while failing to note the War Crimes of the Iraqi government. But haven't they done that for years now? Ignore the War Crimes? Ignore Nouri al-Maliki's goons carrying out his orders to attack peaceful protesters? But suddenly they're concerned about Iraq.
And they've so very big and brave -- what manly men they are, rising from their haunches to bravely call out the Islamic State.
In keeping with their ground breaking announcement that the Islamic State is bad, next week Minority Rights Group International and Unrepresented Nations & Peoples Organization will announce the shocking and ground breaking news that some children hate broccoli.
During the Bully Boy Bush era, Canada largely and wisely sat out the Iraq War. These days, it's foaming at the mouth to get in its 'kills.' Keith Jones (WSWS) observes:
Canada’s Conservative government is steamrolling its new “anti-terrorism” bill through parliament—legislation that tramples on core democratic rights and dramatically augments the power of the state and its national-security apparatus.
The Conservatives, who last fall sent Canada to war yet again, this time in Iraq, are also plotting to involve Canada still more deeply in US imperialism’s global offensive.
In both instances, the government is justifying its actions with the claim that Canada is under attack from Islamist terrorism.
This has been a constant refrain of Prime Minster Stephen Harper and his minsters since the killing of two members of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) last October in separate incidents in St.-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec and Ottawa.
Harper and his Conservatives seized on these killings—the work of deeply troubled individuals who had no connection with each other, let alone any terrorist group in Canada or the Middle East—to advance a pre-planned right-wing agenda.
Minority Rights Group International and Unrepresented Nations & Peoples Organization churned out a report that also reads like a War Hawk attempt to spread fear and encourage more violence. You sort of picture Stephen Harper flipping through with one hand while pulling his pud with the other.
The White House is facing severe criticism for announcing to the press last week that an attempt to drive IS out of Mosul will take place shortly -- no later than May.
Mitchell Prothero (McClatchy Newspapers) reports there are other objections to the White House announcement which include charges that the administration's underestimated the number of Islamic State fighters in Iraq and the level of their dedication:
With the legitimacy of the group’s cross-border claim of authority at stake, analysts said they found it unlikely that the Islamic State would easily give up control of Mosul or dedicate such a small force to protecting it. Many hundreds of Islamic State troops were committed to the failed effort to capture Kobani, a far less important city on the Syria-Turkey border, and Kurdish forces only 12 miles from Mosul report near-daily attacks by hundreds of Islamic State troops.
“The idea that ISIS will vacate Mosul without a substantial fight is almost laughable,” J.M. Berger, an expert on the Islamic State who’s affiliated with the Brookings Institution’s Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World, said in an email. “The timing of the caliphate announcement with the capture of Mosul connects the credibility of the former to their ability to hold the latter in a pretty big way. The caliphate announcement was a clear signal they don’t intend to melt away into the hills.”
The various experts quoted in the article may be correct.
They may be correct in full or in part.
They may also be completely wrong.
I have no idea.
But the attack on the Mosul Museum?
Is the big takeaway there really 'lost cultural heritage'?
For all the hand wringing the press has done, they seem to be missing a point.
That act seems more like a closer.
If you've got a bill of artists performing and Diana Ross is one of them, chances are Diana's closing the concert. Because she's a closer. She's a big deal.
The attack on the Mosul Museum could be a closer too.
Meaning the Islamic State, with the announcement from the White House about an impending attack on Mosul, may be resorting to a few last big acts as they prepare to disperse to other areas.
May be.
I have no idea.
I do know that the Islamic State tends to be elusive and while some might argue they need to hold Mosul to prove their strength, it's also true that they've held it for nearly a year and that they could move to another area of Iraq or just move to strengthen their hold in Anbar.
We noted a little while ago that the Islamic State succeeds via fear and that their actions seemed to be getting more and more desperate in order to garner attention and spread fear.
That could be all the attack on the museum was.
But it could also be part of an attempt to pull off some big moments before they begin dispersing in part or in full from Mosul.
It's amazing that so many outlets can 'cover' an event without ever offering possible reasons for the attack.
Or are we so fear-based that we convince ourselves the attack is just part of 'evil'?
The Islamic State has had a game plan from day one.
The White House mistakenly believes dropping bombs is going to take on the Islamic State. Dropping bombs isn't even playing catch up.
Lying to the American people isn't a way to defeat the Islamic State either. Thursday's snapshot addressed the fact that the White House clearly plans to utilize US troops in on the ground combat despite Barack Obama's June 'promise' otherwise. That's why the AUMF if worded the way it is.
We also noted in Thursday's snapshot that it was past time people started giving serious attention to analyzing the AUMF.
Trevor Timm (Guardian) actually does give it serious attention today and notes:
In the Senate hearing this week, the discussion focused on the nebulous language in the White House’s proposed bill and whether the Obama administration actually wants a ground war or not. The President, for months, has been insisting US combat troops would not be fighting on the ground - aside from their comically narrow definition of “combat troops” - but their war resolution paints a different picture. The language says it would “not authorize the use of the United States armed forces in enduring offensive ground combat operations.” (emphasis mine)
That means combat troops are on the table, the question is only for how long.
It's Trevor Timm so we're noting the above but before anyone e-mails, Timm's factually wrong. (Is that redundant?)
Wednesday's snapshot and Thursday's snapshot cover the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing that Barack's Special Presidential Envoy for The Global Coalition to Counter the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant testified at. That's John Allen.
I was at that hearing and we reported on it. I was at other hearings this week that we haven't had time for. That includes veterans hearings and it includes Tuesday's Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing. Tuesday is when John Kerry testified.
Timm writes:
Secretary of State John Kerry seemed to draw a line in the sand at the Senate hearing: “If you’re going in for weeks and weeks of combat, that’s enduring,” he said. “If you’re going in to assist somebody and fire control and you’re embedded in an overnight deal, or you’re in a rescue operation or whatever, that is not enduring.”
Oh really? At the very same hearing, retired General John Allen, special presidential envoy for the global anti-ISIS coalition, said this: “Enduring might be two weeks, it might be two years.”
Kerry was at the Tuesday hearing. He was not at the Wednesday hearing. Timm needs to correct his error. He also needs to pay a little more attention. The link he offers goes to USA Today where an article clearly notes Kerry testified on Tuesday.
If that's not proof enough, we quoted Senator Barbara Boxer already in our previous coverage -- including this comment she made to Allen:
I know poor Senator -- Secretary [of State John] Kerry had to hear it over and over from our side yesterday. But we're very uncomfortable with this language. And when Senator Menendez was Chairman, he cobbled together a really good AUMF that united all of us on our side because he essentially said no combat troops with these exceptions -- and he put in the kind of exceptions that I think you would agree with -- special forces operations, search and rescue, protecting personnel. And we would urge you, please, to go back and take a look at it. I just feel very strongly.
I knocked Timm last week for his trouble with the facts. The policy there is usually you've had three strikes before I call you out. Timm had his three. His 'reporting' is problematic and that's because he refuses to nail down the facts. Kerry did not testify on Wednesday to that Committee nor did he appear at the same hearing as Allen. These are facts.
You either get them right or you don't.
And it's not just him, it's also the Guardian's editorial oversight -- or lack of it.
If Timm doesn't correct his error soon look for various 'reports' (columns) to repeat the error.
Jessica Schulberg (Huffington Post) reports, "Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.) indicated on Thursday that he may move to prevent President Barack Obama from deploying U.S. ground troops against the Islamic State by introducing a funding bill to limit how the money appropriated for the military campaign can be used."
That was at Thursday's House Armed Services Committee hearing. I wasn't present at that hearing. I'm counting on Jessica Schulberg to have nailed down her facts (she's never had a problem doing that in any piece of hers I've read). People reading Timm's piece are counting on him to nail down his facts as well.
We've noted this week how Mosul may be symbolic -- taking it back from the Islamic State -- but that might be all it was. Walter Smolarek (Liberation) addresses that possibility:
Such a victory would be a much-needed boost to the authority of the central government, led by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi. It would not, however, settle fundamental questions about the future of Iraq. Recent events have shown that the recapture of Mosul would be little more than a cosmetic sign of Iraqi national unity, which has been shredded by the criminal policies of U.S. imperialism.
Thousands of U.S. troops are deployed across Iraq, and even more may be sent to the country in the lead-up to the offensive. In order to placate both a skeptical domestic population as well as militias that are fighting IS but also fought the U.S. occupation following the 2003 invasion, the U.S. government has insisted that they will not engage in direct combat. Instead, the U.S. military presence, aside from the daily aerial bombardment, is claimed to be solely aimed at reconstructing and advising the Iraqi army.
With Congress considering a wide-ranging war authorization and the steady escalation of the U.S. military presence, the ability of the “advisors” to avoid combat, even if they wanted to, is highly questionable.
Friday, Alsumaria reported 6 corpses were discovered dumped in Baghdad -- three of the six were brothers, all were shot dead. They also noted a woman was hanged in Mosul after being accused of helping government security forces (Mosul is occupied by the Islamic State -- and has been since last June), a roadside bombing outside Baquba left 1 police officer dead and three civilians injured, and a Basra home invasion left 3 sisters and their father dead. Sameer N. Yacoub (AP) noted 8 people dead from Baghdad "bombings and mortar strikes."
This morning, Sameer N. Yacoub (AP) reports 2 Balad Ruz car bombings leaving 11 people dead and another fifty injured while a Samarra suicide car bomber took his own live and the lives of 8 other people with fifteen more left injured.
iraq
mcclatchy newspapers
mitchell prothero
A friend who's a TV actress can talk Iraq every few months. Whenever there's a story, for example, about how zoo animals are hunted in Iraq, she's all over it. She's outraged. She's angry. Her speech can go on for 90 minutes -- and it is a speech, it's not a conversation.
And I guess I should be grateful that in a world of apathy -- in the United States of Apathy -- she thinks passionately about Iraq at all.
But, no offense to the big game animals, I'm really more concerned with human life in Iraq. I didn't notice, for example, anyone getting upset about the slaughter when new buildings or US outposts in Iraq were accompanied by the ritualistic slaughter/sacrifice of an animal.
I bring this up because in Thursday's snapshot we quoted the Metropolitan Museum on the attack on the Mosul Museum.
We could have quoted any number of organizations or what have you. To me, however, if it's a museum that's attacked, let's listen to what another museum is saying. And I think it's valid for museums around the world to issue statements.
But there's valid and then there's questionable.
A.R. Williams (National Geographic) reports:
Islamic State militants released a video on Thursday showing the destruction of priceless antiquities in northern Iraq.
Running for more than five minutes, the video records men toppling statues in a museum and smashing them with sledgehammers, and attacking other statues at an archaeological site with a jackhammer.
And I think about it and, yeah, this is something National Geographic should be on, it's their reporting beat. The Guardian carries a column by Haifa Zangana which notes:
Earlier attacks on Mosul’s heritage by Isis targeted the tomb of Nabi Yunus (the prophet Jonah), and the grave of Abu al-Hassan al-Jazari, a 12th- and 13th-century historiographer known as ibn al-Athir.
The destruction of Mosul’s history is a crime against people who are proud of their education and heritage, and fully aware of the value, for example, of the library of Ashurbanipal, King of Assyria (668-627BC), with its 22,000 cuneiform tablets. Destruction of monuments that have been preserved through 14 centuries of Islam in Iraq is widely abhorred. These actions can be likened to the barbarism of an extreme sect in early Islam that demolished the shrine in Mecca.
And there's no question Iraqi novelist Haifa should be weighing in. But Pravada's got a report that opens, "Islamic State has committed yet another atrocity, adding vandalism and desecration of world cultural heritage to its list of crimes. UNESCO has expressed outrage over the attack on Mosul Museum and the destruction of statues and other artefacts, and has called for an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council." And AFP's report notes, "Archaeologists and heritage experts called for urgent action to protect the remains of some of oldest civilisations in the world." BBC offers, "The reported destruction of the statues follows recent reports that IS burnt down Mosul Library, which housed over 8,000 ancient manuscripts." And CNN has filed multiple stories including this one.
And we could go on and on with all the outlets filing stories.
But here's the thing, I can remember when Nouri used his Minister of the Interior to go after Iraq's LGBT and Emo and suspected LGBT and Emo communities.
And I can remember the reality -- not spin, not rumors -- of the violent deaths by stoning (often with bricks) or super-gluing the anuses, etc.
And I can remember the US press and the world press ignoring it for weeks and weeks.
I can remember getting traction with friends in the music press (including one who got a deal that I would stop slamming him if his publication tackled the story) and how even that took forever and took a mountain of work.
I love books, I love art, I love film and music but I don't think I value art more than I value human life.
But I'm not sure our modern press can say the same.
Forget the LGBT issue for a moment, it's also true 2010 through 2014 saw a vicious government assault on the Sunnis in Iraq and very few wanted to report on it. Some, like Patrick Cockburn, did so begrudgingly and minimized while 'covering' it. (Which is why Patrick Cockburn's reputation is so awful in the Arab world.)
I'm an artist. I believe in art. But I believe we can and do create new art every day. And if you told me a ship was sinking and we could save five people or save Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa which was also on the ship for some reason, I'd say save the five people.
That's not me calling art or culture disposable but it is me noting that people are needed for art: they're needed to appreciate it, they're needed for it to have value.
So it bothers me that when people are being killed by their own government, the world press is happy to take a pass.. But some objects being destroyed gets the attention of the entire world press.
I love animals, I love art. I just question the priorities of a global press which repeatedly finds ways to be outraged over something other than the deliberate killing of people.
Nearly fifteen months of daily bombings of civilian areas in Iraq -- in Sunni dominate Falluja -- by the Iraqi military -- bombings that have wounded and killed thousands -- has, in nearly fifteen months, received not even 1/4 of the coverage the attack on the Mosul Museum has received in 48 hours.
Again, I question the priorities of the global press.
For decades, the joke was that UPI was the Ethel Mertz of the global press. These days Ethel Mertz seems quite a bit loftier than any press outlet.
(That reputation preceded the Unification Church's purchase of UPI -- preceded it by decades. Ethel Mertz is the character Vivian Vance played on I Love Lucy, a character who always enjoyed sharing a juicy tidbit with Lucille Ball's Lucy Ricardo.)
The priorities seem skewed at best. Like with this [PDF format warning] report by alleged friends like Minority Rights Group International and Unrepresented Nations & Peoples Organization. The report supposedly is concerned with War Crimes in Iraq. I'm supposed to be using this site to promote it.
The fact that I was being asked (strong-armed) into promoting the Friday briefing that the report would be released at while at the same time not being able to see the report myself ahead of time was enough to set my 'Spidey sense' tingling and I said no.
And I've now read the report and I'm glad I said no.
Is that a report?
Because it reads like a cry for war.
I also don't get the bravery or the need to call out the Islamic State.
What's next? An emergency press release announcing Adolf Hitler was evil?
Watch this: Adolf Hitler should burn in hell!
Do you know I will probably not get one e-mail complaining about that statement.
It takes no courage to call out Adolf Hitler.
It also takes no courage -- if you're outside of Iraq or Syria -- to call out the Islamic State.
But a worthless report of 38 pages goes on and on about War Crimes carried out by the Islamic State while failing to note the War Crimes of the Iraqi government. But haven't they done that for years now? Ignore the War Crimes? Ignore Nouri al-Maliki's goons carrying out his orders to attack peaceful protesters? But suddenly they're concerned about Iraq.
And they've so very big and brave -- what manly men they are, rising from their haunches to bravely call out the Islamic State.
In keeping with their ground breaking announcement that the Islamic State is bad, next week Minority Rights Group International and Unrepresented Nations & Peoples Organization will announce the shocking and ground breaking news that some children hate broccoli.
During the Bully Boy Bush era, Canada largely and wisely sat out the Iraq War. These days, it's foaming at the mouth to get in its 'kills.' Keith Jones (WSWS) observes:
Canada’s Conservative government is steamrolling its new “anti-terrorism” bill through parliament—legislation that tramples on core democratic rights and dramatically augments the power of the state and its national-security apparatus.
The Conservatives, who last fall sent Canada to war yet again, this time in Iraq, are also plotting to involve Canada still more deeply in US imperialism’s global offensive.
In both instances, the government is justifying its actions with the claim that Canada is under attack from Islamist terrorism.
This has been a constant refrain of Prime Minster Stephen Harper and his minsters since the killing of two members of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) last October in separate incidents in St.-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec and Ottawa.
Harper and his Conservatives seized on these killings—the work of deeply troubled individuals who had no connection with each other, let alone any terrorist group in Canada or the Middle East—to advance a pre-planned right-wing agenda.
Minority Rights Group International and Unrepresented Nations & Peoples Organization churned out a report that also reads like a War Hawk attempt to spread fear and encourage more violence. You sort of picture Stephen Harper flipping through with one hand while pulling his pud with the other.
The White House is facing severe criticism for announcing to the press last week that an attempt to drive IS out of Mosul will take place shortly -- no later than May.
Mitchell Prothero (McClatchy Newspapers) reports there are other objections to the White House announcement which include charges that the administration's underestimated the number of Islamic State fighters in Iraq and the level of their dedication:
With the legitimacy of the group’s cross-border claim of authority at stake, analysts said they found it unlikely that the Islamic State would easily give up control of Mosul or dedicate such a small force to protecting it. Many hundreds of Islamic State troops were committed to the failed effort to capture Kobani, a far less important city on the Syria-Turkey border, and Kurdish forces only 12 miles from Mosul report near-daily attacks by hundreds of Islamic State troops.
“The idea that ISIS will vacate Mosul without a substantial fight is almost laughable,” J.M. Berger, an expert on the Islamic State who’s affiliated with the Brookings Institution’s Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World, said in an email. “The timing of the caliphate announcement with the capture of Mosul connects the credibility of the former to their ability to hold the latter in a pretty big way. The caliphate announcement was a clear signal they don’t intend to melt away into the hills.”
The various experts quoted in the article may be correct.
They may be correct in full or in part.
They may also be completely wrong.
I have no idea.
But the attack on the Mosul Museum?
Is the big takeaway there really 'lost cultural heritage'?
For all the hand wringing the press has done, they seem to be missing a point.
That act seems more like a closer.
If you've got a bill of artists performing and Diana Ross is one of them, chances are Diana's closing the concert. Because she's a closer. She's a big deal.
The attack on the Mosul Museum could be a closer too.
Meaning the Islamic State, with the announcement from the White House about an impending attack on Mosul, may be resorting to a few last big acts as they prepare to disperse to other areas.
May be.
I have no idea.
I do know that the Islamic State tends to be elusive and while some might argue they need to hold Mosul to prove their strength, it's also true that they've held it for nearly a year and that they could move to another area of Iraq or just move to strengthen their hold in Anbar.
We noted a little while ago that the Islamic State succeeds via fear and that their actions seemed to be getting more and more desperate in order to garner attention and spread fear.
That could be all the attack on the museum was.
But it could also be part of an attempt to pull off some big moments before they begin dispersing in part or in full from Mosul.
It's amazing that so many outlets can 'cover' an event without ever offering possible reasons for the attack.
Or are we so fear-based that we convince ourselves the attack is just part of 'evil'?
The Islamic State has had a game plan from day one.
The White House mistakenly believes dropping bombs is going to take on the Islamic State. Dropping bombs isn't even playing catch up.
Lying to the American people isn't a way to defeat the Islamic State either. Thursday's snapshot addressed the fact that the White House clearly plans to utilize US troops in on the ground combat despite Barack Obama's June 'promise' otherwise. That's why the AUMF if worded the way it is.
We also noted in Thursday's snapshot that it was past time people started giving serious attention to analyzing the AUMF.
Trevor Timm (Guardian) actually does give it serious attention today and notes:
In the Senate hearing this week, the discussion focused on the nebulous language in the White House’s proposed bill and whether the Obama administration actually wants a ground war or not. The President, for months, has been insisting US combat troops would not be fighting on the ground - aside from their comically narrow definition of “combat troops” - but their war resolution paints a different picture. The language says it would “not authorize the use of the United States armed forces in enduring offensive ground combat operations.” (emphasis mine)
That means combat troops are on the table, the question is only for how long.
It's Trevor Timm so we're noting the above but before anyone e-mails, Timm's factually wrong. (Is that redundant?)
Wednesday's snapshot and Thursday's snapshot cover the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing that Barack's Special Presidential Envoy for The Global Coalition to Counter the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant testified at. That's John Allen.
I was at that hearing and we reported on it. I was at other hearings this week that we haven't had time for. That includes veterans hearings and it includes Tuesday's Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing. Tuesday is when John Kerry testified.
Timm writes:
Secretary of State John Kerry seemed to draw a line in the sand at the Senate hearing: “If you’re going in for weeks and weeks of combat, that’s enduring,” he said. “If you’re going in to assist somebody and fire control and you’re embedded in an overnight deal, or you’re in a rescue operation or whatever, that is not enduring.”
Oh really? At the very same hearing, retired General John Allen, special presidential envoy for the global anti-ISIS coalition, said this: “Enduring might be two weeks, it might be two years.”
Kerry was at the Tuesday hearing. He was not at the Wednesday hearing. Timm needs to correct his error. He also needs to pay a little more attention. The link he offers goes to USA Today where an article clearly notes Kerry testified on Tuesday.
If that's not proof enough, we quoted Senator Barbara Boxer already in our previous coverage -- including this comment she made to Allen:
I know poor Senator -- Secretary [of State John] Kerry had to hear it over and over from our side yesterday. But we're very uncomfortable with this language. And when Senator Menendez was Chairman, he cobbled together a really good AUMF that united all of us on our side because he essentially said no combat troops with these exceptions -- and he put in the kind of exceptions that I think you would agree with -- special forces operations, search and rescue, protecting personnel. And we would urge you, please, to go back and take a look at it. I just feel very strongly.
I knocked Timm last week for his trouble with the facts. The policy there is usually you've had three strikes before I call you out. Timm had his three. His 'reporting' is problematic and that's because he refuses to nail down the facts. Kerry did not testify on Wednesday to that Committee nor did he appear at the same hearing as Allen. These are facts.
You either get them right or you don't.
And it's not just him, it's also the Guardian's editorial oversight -- or lack of it.
If Timm doesn't correct his error soon look for various 'reports' (columns) to repeat the error.
Jessica Schulberg (Huffington Post) reports, "Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.) indicated on Thursday that he may move to prevent President Barack Obama from deploying U.S. ground troops against the Islamic State by introducing a funding bill to limit how the money appropriated for the military campaign can be used."
That was at Thursday's House Armed Services Committee hearing. I wasn't present at that hearing. I'm counting on Jessica Schulberg to have nailed down her facts (she's never had a problem doing that in any piece of hers I've read). People reading Timm's piece are counting on him to nail down his facts as well.
We've noted this week how Mosul may be symbolic -- taking it back from the Islamic State -- but that might be all it was. Walter Smolarek (Liberation) addresses that possibility:
Such a victory would be a much-needed boost to the authority of the central government, led by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi. It would not, however, settle fundamental questions about the future of Iraq. Recent events have shown that the recapture of Mosul would be little more than a cosmetic sign of Iraqi national unity, which has been shredded by the criminal policies of U.S. imperialism.
Thousands of U.S. troops are deployed across Iraq, and even more may be sent to the country in the lead-up to the offensive. In order to placate both a skeptical domestic population as well as militias that are fighting IS but also fought the U.S. occupation following the 2003 invasion, the U.S. government has insisted that they will not engage in direct combat. Instead, the U.S. military presence, aside from the daily aerial bombardment, is claimed to be solely aimed at reconstructing and advising the Iraqi army.
With Congress considering a wide-ranging war authorization and the steady escalation of the U.S. military presence, the ability of the “advisors” to avoid combat, even if they wanted to, is highly questionable.
Friday, Alsumaria reported 6 corpses were discovered dumped in Baghdad -- three of the six were brothers, all were shot dead. They also noted a woman was hanged in Mosul after being accused of helping government security forces (Mosul is occupied by the Islamic State -- and has been since last June), a roadside bombing outside Baquba left 1 police officer dead and three civilians injured, and a Basra home invasion left 3 sisters and their father dead. Sameer N. Yacoub (AP) noted 8 people dead from Baghdad "bombings and mortar strikes."
This morning, Sameer N. Yacoub (AP) reports 2 Balad Ruz car bombings leaving 11 people dead and another fifty injured while a Samarra suicide car bomber took his own live and the lives of 8 other people with fifteen more left injured.
iraq
mcclatchy newspapers
mitchell prothero
