Ruth's Report: Prince Hunter

When you are little, you may dream of meeting the man of your dreams. You may identify with Cinderella, for example, and hope some shows up with your shoe or that you were Snow White and someone kisses you and brings you (back) to life.

The rescue fantasy is common for some.

And it may cause some of us to seek out a Prince Charming.

And some of us, so desperate for that prince, end up settling for a real jerk. I fear that is what happened to Kathleen Buhle:

In her new memoir, Kathleen Buhle describes the moment when she learned of her now-ex husband Hunter Biden's affair with their sister-in-law, Hallie Biden.

The revelation came from her family therapist and daughters in November 2016, more than a year after Hallie's husband and Joe Biden's son Beau died of a glioblastoma brain tumor on May 30, 2015.

Buhle's daughter Finnegan summoned her to the family therapist's office, and asked "Debbie" to break the news when Finnegan said she couldn't do it herself, according to an excerpt of the memoir published Wednesday in People.

"Debbie looked me in the eye and calmly said, 'Kathleen, Hunter's having an affair with Hallie,'" Buhle wrote in "If We Break," to be released on June 14.

She got the frog instead of the prince? A frog would have been better than Hunter Biden.

Be sure to read Marcia's "The Blacklist" if you have not already done so.

This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for today:

Wednesday, June 1, 2022. US President Joe Biden continues to persecute Julian Assange though some hope a new government in Australia may mean the end of that, Iraq continues to be hit hard by climate change and much more.

US President Joe Biden continues to tank in the polls leading to the chatter that, after the mid0terms, he'll be getting a new chief of staff and making other changes. After. In the meantime, while over 50% of Americans think he;s doing a bad job, he continues to persecute Julian Assange in his never-ending war on the First Amendment. Julian's 'crime' remains reporting the truth. It's a sad country that goes after someone for telling the truth. Joe needs to drop his demand that the UK turn Julian over to US authorities.

Julian did not commit treason -- as an Australian citizen, he cant carry out treason against the United States. Australia's recent election has some hoping that Julian's ordeal might come to an end. Last week, Brendan Mounter and Adam Stephen (Australia's ABC) reported:

The family of Julian Assange is hopeful the election of a federal Labor government will pave the way for the WikiLeaks founder's eventual release and a return to Australia.

It has been almost a decade since Mr Assange, who originally hails from Townsville in north Queensland, has been a free man.

For the past three years, he has been in high security detention at Belmarsh Prison in the United Kingdom, after seven years of asylum within London's Ecuadorian embassy in a bid to avoid arrest.

United States authorities have sought Mr Assange's extradition from the UK so he can stand trial on charges of espionage and computer misuse relating to hundreds of thousands of leaked cables from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

His brother, film producer Gabriel Shipton, said Mr Assange had been persecuted for publishing the ugly truths of war.

"Julian is accused of what investigative journalists do all the time, which is sourcing and publishing materials from a source, Chelsea Manning," Mr Shipton said.

Rachel Evans (GREEN LEFT) adds:

Free Julian Assange activists took action outside Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's Marrickville office on May 26 and asked him to “Make Julian Assange’s freedom top priority”.

While in opposition, Albanese told a Labor caucus meeting in February last year that “enough was enough” and “I don't have sympathy for many of his actions but essentially I can't see what is served by keeping him incarcerated”.

Latika Bourke (SYDNEY MORNING HERALD) reports:

Government MP Julian Hill has urged Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to stick to his principles and encourage the United States to drop its extradition of Julian Assange.

When opposition leader, Albanese declared Assange’s incarceration in the United Kingdom – pending his extradition to the United States, where he faces spying charges – had gone on long enough and he wanted him freed.

Asked during Tuesday night’s press conference if he would match his rhetoric as opposition leader now he is prime minister and encourage the United States to drop the charges, Albanese said “my position is that not all foreign affairs is best done with the loud hailer”.

Government backbencher Julian Hill, a member of the bipartisan Bring Julian Assange Home parliamentary group, on Twitter attacked the use of “weasel words”.

“I hope one of the first acts of our new cabinet will be to speak up for our fellow citizen and demand the US government drop the shameful prosecution of Julian Assange,” he wrote.

Guy Rundle (CRIKEY) argues:

The US charges are thus an attack on journalism, done by a non-US citizen, not on US soil, and published, after months of cooperative work, on US soil by The New York Times, whose editors and publishers have not been charged with anything.

The Morrison government made no objection at all to extradition, trusting in “the British justice system”, and implicitly supporting US prosecution through silence. Albanese Labor looks like it will be little better.

“As an Australian citizen, he is entitled to consular assistance,” Penny Wong stated in April. “We also expect the government to keep seeking assurances from both the UK and US that he’s treated fairly and humanely … Consular matters are regularly raised with counterparts, they are regularly raised and this one would be no different.”

This is pathetic and gutless. Labor should honour the basic commitment to free speech and the investigation of hidden power that was an essential task of the labour movement in establishing its right to exist, and its capacity to succeed. The government is not required to stand with every citizen in trouble abroad, but this case is clear: an Australian citizen is being threatened with decades of prison for activities that are essential to the sort of journalism that is constitutive of a pluralist and open society, built on free speech and free inquiry.

Labor is being completely hypocritical in its silence on Assange. In 2018 and 2019, it was very happy to use the leaks-based story by Annika Smethurst on the increased surveillance of Australian citizens by reorganised spy agencies to attack the Coalition government, and then to attack them for the federal police raid on, and threatened prosecution of, Smethurst, calling it the mark of a “tin pot autocracy”.

Will Australia continue to be the lapdog of the US and UK or will it find the courage to stand up for one of its own citizens? Looks like the new prime minister will have his defining moment early in his term.

In Iraq, still no new government. Elections were held October 10th. In nine days, it will be eight months since those elections took place. Trevor Filseth (THE NATIONL INTEREST) states:

Although Sadr’s faction, the Sadrist Movement, won 73 out of 329 seats, making it the largest party in parliament, it has been unable to expand its coalition to include two-thirds of the parliament, the number required to elect a president and therefore to form a government. Sadr’s bloc, the Saving the Homeland alliance, now includes the Sadrist Movement, the Sunni Sovereignty Alliance, and the Kurdish Kurdistan Democratic Party; its cross-sectarian nature has given it significant support in each of Iraq’s regions and a majority of 180 seats in parliament, but it remains well short of the 220 needed for a presidential election. Most legislators not in the Sadrist camp or the pro-Iran camp have boycotted legislative sessions, waiting for concessions from either Sadr or the CFA in exchange for their support.

Under Iraq’s post-2003 governing system, the country’s ceremonial presidency is typically given to a Kurd, while the prime minister is normally a Shia and the speaker of parliament a Sunni. Sadr’s alliance has placed its support behind Rebar Ahmed, the current interior minister of Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region, for the presidency, while the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), the main competing Kurdish party, has supported the re-election of current president Barham Salih. Outside commentators have suggested that Sadr’s alliance might partner with the PUK, which has not aligned with the pro-Iran bloc, if the question of the presidential nomination could be resolved.

Although the parliament should have been dissolved after the initial failure to elect a president, some legislators have opposed the dissolution out of concern that they could lose their seats in a rematch, and have raised concerns that a second election with similar results would simply lead to a recurring failure to form a government.

Last fall, the western press (espeically the US press) insisted Moqtada was a "king maker." Oops.

Mustafa Shilani (KURDISTAN 24) reports:

A "new initiative" to end the political impasse in Iraq will be announced in June, said Arafat Karam, the official in charge of the government and parliamentary file at Barzani Headquarters, on Tuesday.

In an interview with Kurdistan 24, Karam revealed that a new initiative is expected to be announced on June 11 to end the political deadlock in Iraq.

He added that the Iraqi situation is "very complicated" without a president. Iraq has failed to select a new president and prime minister even though it has been seven months since the last parliamentary elections.

DW notes:

In a few days, Iraq will probably break a record. But it's not necessarily something for the country to be proud of. Iraq has now been without an official government for just over 200 days.

Although the Middle Eastern nation isn't close to breaking the world record for the longest period without an elected government — that's held by Belgium, with well over 500 days — the last time this happened in Baghdad was in 2010, and the record for Iraq back then was 208 days.

The outlet, apparently in the midst of a nasty bender, then goes on to speculate that this might be a good thing. In essence, it states, "Don't think of the car as totaled, think of it as just pulled out of the race."

Salah Nasrawi (AHRAM) explains:

On 5 May, a powerful desert storm passed through most of Iraq, with the dust turning skies orange over many of the country’s major cities. By the end of the following day, it had sent 4,000 people to hospital with breathing problems.

Government offices and schools were shut, and airports in Baghdad and several other cities suspended flights for hours as a thick sandstorm blanketed the country.

It was the fifth powerful sandstorm to engulf Iraq within a month, with the storms occurring on an almost weekly basis and totalling ten by the end of May with more expected.

Sandstorms usually hit Iraq in the spring and scour large swathes of the country, flood the streets of major cities with sand, hamper visibility, blow down electricity poles, uproot trees, and reduce air quality.

But a typical spring would see only about one to three storms per month.

This year, as well as their frequency, their impact has also been more severe, particularly in health terms, with more casualties caused by plummeting air quality generated by wind thick with sand and other particles.

While sandstorms are common at this time of year in Iraq, they are now more powerful, sweep across larger areas, and occur with unprecedented frequency.

Iraq’s Environment Ministry has warned that over the next two decades the country could endure an average of 272 days of sandstorms a year, rising to above 300 by 2050.

Oh, c/an't we all be like DW and ignore the suffering and look for that silver lining (that really doesn't exist)

Sure, people are suffering in the drought but, hey, ancient city revealed, right? :

Sinan Mahmoud (THE NATIONAL) reports:

An Iraqi-German archaeological team raced against time to excavate and document a Bronze Age city in northern Iraq before it disappeared underwater.

As drought caused water levels to recede in the Mosul Dam's reservoir last winter, the remains of a 3,400-year-old Mittani Empire-era city once located on the Tigris emerged, an Iraqi official told The National on Tuesday.

The Mittani Empire was a kingdom that ruled parts of Syria and northern Mesopotamia, modern day Iraq, from the 15th century to the 14th century BC. The city, known as Zakhiku, is at Kemune in the northern Kurdistan Region of Iraq.

The team started excavating the city in 2018, when they revealed what was probably a palace with large walls, Dr Hasan Qasim, chairman of the Kurdistan Archaeology Organisation, said.

Fifteen clay tablets with cuneiform writing were also unearthed at the time, Dr Qasim said.

Let's all be DW and ignored the suffering from the drought and just focus on the lost city. Not on Salam Zidane's report for AL-MONITOR:

On May 8, the Iraqi Ministry of Agriculture warned that 90 percent of Iraqi agricultural land has been desertified or is at risk of desertification in the near future, due to climate change and water disputes with Iran and Turkey.

In 2020, the ministry had warned that the rate of desertification in Iraq had risen to 53%. This poses a great danger not only to the environment, but also to food security, which has become threatened after the harvest of strategic crops such as wheat, barley, and rice has dropped.

The ministry has also stated that Iraq ranks fifth in the world in severity of climate change effects.

Rawya Mazal, the official in charge of the desertification dossier at the Ministry of Agriculture, told Al-Monitor that issues contributing to the problem include global warming, drought, excessive use of water by farmers and citizens, in addition to wars and military operations.

“Iraq urgently needs to negotiate with Turkey and Iran to release water, reduce water consumption and eliminate excessive use, and establish a canal to harvest rainwater, with desert oases,” she explained. Also, reducing air pollution would mitigate the rise in temperatures.

Mazal stressed that if urgent measures are not taken, the Iraq scenario will be the worst in the region. She said that 92% of Iraq suffers from desertification or is at risk, and that Sawa Lake in Samawah has completely dried out.

Adel al-Mokhtar, Adviser to Parliament’s Agriculture Committee, told Al-Monitor that Iraq’s water reserves amount to 20 billion cubic meters, and the country may consume all of it this year. Turkey, Iran, and Syria are also suffering from a water crisis, which will require cooperation to overcome.

Next Wednesday, there may not be a snapshot. Or it might go up earlier or later than usual. Just giving a heads up.

The following sites updated: