"I'm GGG and I approve this message."

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
I would be much less inclined to let a valet park my car if I were not insured.

or if there was no government.

[Adder]

Originally posted by Spanky
Geopolitical Diary: Iran’s al-Sadrite Problem
April 16, 2008
The Associated Press reported Tuesday that differences have surfaced between the U.S. and Iraqi governments on how to deal with radical Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr.

While Shia-dominated Baghdad had assumed a far tougher attitude towards al-Sadr — wanting to eliminate him as a political force altogether — Washington is seeking to accommodate the Shiite leader in the political process.

Meanwhile, as the Americans and the Iraqis figure out what to do with al-Sadr, the Iranians have their own set of problems with his movement. Iran enjoys a significant amount of influence over al-Sadr, giving the country the ability to rein him in, especially on several recent occasions. But the relationship between Iran and the maverick cleric-to-be is both complex and problematic. While the Iranians are providing al-Sadr with the opportunity to establish his clerical credentials by allowing him to pursue his studies in their seminary city of Qom, they have also used punitive tools to keep him in line.

One tool includes a murder case filed in an Iranian court against al-Sadr by the family of Ayatollah Abdul-Majid al-Khoei, an assassinated Iraqi Shiite cleric, according to an April 10 report in the UK-based Saudi news website Elaph. Al-Khoei was gunned down by unidentified assailants in Najaf in April 2003 when he returned from exile in London following the toppling of the Baathist regime. The murder victim was the son of Grand Ayatollah Sayyid Abul-Qassim al-Khoei, an internationally renowned Iraqi Shiite cleric and the mentor of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

Initially, the cleric’s family filed a case with Iraqi authorities blaming al-Sadr along with 27 other individuals for the murder. Although a judge issued an arrest warrant for al-Sadr, it was never executed. Overall, U.S. and Iraqi authorities did not pursue the matter. They decided to back off given the power of his Medhi Army militia and Iraq’s unstable political situation.

Frustrated with the situation, al-Khoei’s family decided to take the matter to the Iranians. The case was brought to the attention of a special court established by the Islamic Republic founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini that is designed to prosecute clerics who violate the law. It seems the case has stalled there. Although it has not been pursued, it also had not been dismissed.

Given certain jurisdictional issues, the Iranians cannot technically prosecute al-Sadr since he is neither an Iranian national nor a cleric. Furthermore, al-Khoei’s family members are ideological rivals to the Iranians. In fact, Tehran views them as U.S. lackeys and has reveled in seeing them suffer setbacks.

However, the lingering case still provides the Iranians with a handy method of keeping al-Sadr in check and managing his ability to upset its plans for Iraq. But the power of the Iranians to intimidate al-Sadr only extends so far, given his large following among the Iraqi Shia. Iranians have no interest in jeopardizing the relationships they have spent the last five years cultivating with the al-Sadrites. But that does not diminish the strong opposition many Iranians feel toward al-Sadr.

Tehran has long viewed al-Sadr as a political wildcard who can never be completely tamed. Recently, his willfulness was demonstrated in a March 29 interview with al-Jazeera in which he recalled a meeting with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

“I told him that we share the same ideology, but that politically and militarily, I would not be an extension of Iran, and that there were negative things that Iran was doing in Iraq,” al-Sadr reportedly said in the interview. “I mentioned to him a few things that Iran needs to rectify with regard to Iraq. Iran committed mistakes that it should not have made.”

Whether or not al-Sadr actually said this to Khamenei matters little, but the claims — made on an international television station — have still caused a significant stir within Iran. In fact, many senior Iranian officials have publicly criticized al-Sadr. Those critics include Mohammed Baqer Ghalibaf, the mayor of Tehran, who is seen as the main challenger to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in next year’s presidential election. Another power critic includes Mohsen Rezai, secretary of the Expediency Council and the former head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

This situation is being watched closely by Saudi Arabia, which is eager to counter an emerging Iran by exploiting intra-Shia rifts. This position could explain why news of the impending murder case was reported by a Saudi media group while it has received little publicity elsewhere. The Saudis realize problems between Iran and Iraqi Shia, hamper Iran’s ability to threaten their national security. Therein lies al-Sadr’s ability to serve as a potential arrestor to Iranian ambitions in Iraq and the region.

The Saudis are not the only ones happy to see the wrangling between al-Sadr and Iran. The United States, engaged in multiple complex dealings with Iraqi factions in order to block Iran’s path towards regional dominance, would also like to see as many obstacles in the path of Iran as possible. While it continues to create a bulwark among Iraq’s Sunnis, Washington can certainly benefit from a Shiite thorn in Iran’s side and recent comments from top U.S. officials have almost rallied behind al-Sadr.

Last week in fact, al-Sadr was described as “a significant political figure,” by U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates who added that the United States wanted the Shiite leader to work within the political process. Additionally Gen. David Petraeus, top U.S. commander in Iraq, called the al-Sadrite movement a major force that should be accommodated to varying degrees.

Politicking aside, it is unlikely that Washington can align with al-Sadr, given his radical Islamist ideology and anti-occupation nationalist stance although an understanding could develop. Whether or not that happens remains to be seen. However, what is clear is that al-Sadr is proving to be a problem for Iran and his influence could play a key role in preventing the Iranians from dominating Iraq in the long run.

I keep hearing (on NPR at least) that the ties between Maliki's party and Iran are much stronger those between Sadr and Iran, for the reasons this article mentions.

[Spanky]

I got the opportunity to watch a focus group last night during the Democrat debate. It was twenty five Republicans, twenty five Democrats, and fifty decline to state voters. The entire Decline to States had to be undecided (or at least claim they were).

The first thing that was amazing is how many people don't pay attention to the news. Things we think are common knowledge are not.

I had heard in the press that Obama's connection with Wright, the Underground and his comments about middle class voters had been absorbed by the population and didn't affect the polls.

The focused group I watched showed that wasn't true. Much of the group was shocked by some of the revelations about Obama. When Hillary talked about Wright making those comments right after 9-11 the favorability ratings for Obama went right down the tubes. Each participant had little levers for both Hillary and Obama and could turn them back or forth concerning what they thought of the candidate.

Before the debate people in the Focus group said they trusted Obama more than Hillary by about two to one. After the debate only about twenty five percent said they trusted Obama. Obama's trust rating dropped below Hillary’s. Most of the people found Obama's answers to be dishonest and evasive.

About ten of the Democrats and a couple of the independents were completely in love with Obama, and spoke about him like he was the second coming. The rest seemed very to extremely wary of the guy.

I am now thoroughly convinced Obama is unelectable. If the Democrats were running similar focus groups the super delegates must now realize this guy is a non starter. The Super delegates may just step up to the plate and nominate Hillary.

The Super delegates were introduced to stop McGovern like candidates; it seems that this was the exact type of situation they were planning on when they instituted the system. If Obama is the nominee it will be an early Christmas gift to the Republicans this year.

[Not Bob]

Originally posted by Spanky
.... If Obama is the nominee it will be an early Christmas gift to the Republicans this year.

Dream on, Spanky. I will make you the same offer I made Hank (which he has declined to accept without adding some bizarro "kickers" about states that I think are silly) -- if Obama is the nominee, I bet that he will beat McCain. One month of board support.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Not Bob
Dream on, Spanky. I will make you the same offer I made Hank (which he has declined to accept without adding some bizarro "kickers" about states that I think are silly) -- if Obama is the nominee, I bet that he will beat McCain. One month of board support.

What is one month of board support? Is that some sort of donation? How much?

[Spanky]

Candidate on a High Horse

By George Will

Barack Obama may be exactly what his supporters suppose him to be. Not, however, for reasons most Americans will celebrate.


Obama may be the fulfillment of modern liberalism. Explaining why many working-class voters are "bitter," he said they "cling" to guns, religion and "antipathy to people who aren't like them" because of "frustrations." His implication was that their primitivism, superstition and bigotry are balm for resentments they feel because of America's grinding injustice.


By so speaking, Obama does fulfill liberalism's transformation since Franklin Roosevelt. What had been under FDR a celebration of America and the values of its working people has become a doctrine of condescension toward those people and the supposedly coarse and vulgar country that pleases them.


When a supporter told Adlai Stevenson, the losing Democratic presidential nominee in 1952 and 1956, that thinking people supported him, Stevenson said, "Yes, but I need to win a majority." When another supporter told Stevenson, "You educated the people through your campaign," Stevenson replied, "But a lot of people flunked the course." Michael Barone, in "Our Country: The Shaping of America From Roosevelt to Reagan," wrote: "It is unthinkable that Roosevelt would ever have said those things or that such thoughts ever would have crossed his mind." Barone added: "Stevenson was the first leading Democratic politician to become a critic rather than a celebrator of middle-class American culture — the prototype of the liberal Democrat who would judge ordinary Americans by an abstract standard and find them wanting."


Stevenson, like Obama, energized young, educated professionals for whom, Barone wrote, "what was attractive was not his platform but his attitude." They sought from Stevenson "not so much changes in public policy as validation of their own cultural stance." They especially rejected "American exceptionalism, the notion that the United States was specially good and decent," rather than — in Michelle Obama's words — "just downright mean."


The emblematic book of the new liberalism was "The Affluent Society" by Harvard economist John Kenneth Galbraith. He argued that the power of advertising to manipulate the bovine public is so powerful that the law of supply and demand has been vitiated. Manufacturers can manufacture in the American herd whatever demand the manufacturers want to supply. Because the manipulable masses are easily given a "false consciousness" (another category, like religion as the "opiate" of the suffering masses, that liberalism appropriated from Marxism), four things follow:


First, the consent of the governed, when their behavior is governed by their false consciousnesses, is unimportant. Second, the public requires the supervision of a progressive elite which, somehow emancipated from false consciousness, can engineer true consciousness. Third, because consciousness is a reflection of social conditions, true consciousness is engineered by progressive social reforms. Fourth, because people in the grip of false consciousness cannot be expected to demand or even consent to such reforms, those reforms usually must be imposed, for example, by judicial fiats.


The iconic public intellectual of liberal condescension was Columbia University historian Richard Hofstadter, who died in 1970 but whose spirit still permeated that school when Obama matriculated there in 1981. Hofstadter pioneered the rhetorical tactic that Obama has revived with his diagnosis of working-class Democrats as victims — the indispensable category in liberal theory. The tactic is to dismiss rather than refute those with whom you disagree.


Obama's dismissal is: Americans, especially working-class conservatives, are unable, because of their false consciousness, to deconstruct their social context and embrace the liberal program. Today that program is to elect Obama, thereby making his wife at long last proud of America.


Hofstadter dismissed conservatives as victims of character flaws and psychological disorders — a "paranoid style" of politics rooted in "status anxiety," etc. Conservatism rose on a tide of votes cast by people irritated by the liberalism of condescension.


Obama voiced such liberalism with his "bitterness" remarks to an audience of affluent San Franciscans. Perfect.


When Democrats convened in San Francisco in 1984, en route to losing 49 states, Jeane Kirkpatrick — a former FDR Democrat then serving in the Cabinet of another such, Ronald Reagan — said "San Francisco Democrats" are people who "blame America first." Today they blame Americans for America being "downright mean."


Obama's apology for his embittering sociology of "bitterness" — "I didn't say it as well as I should have" — occurred in Muncie, Ind. Perfect.


In 1929 and 1937, Robert and Helen Lynd published two seminal books of American sociology. They were sympathetic studies of a medium-size manufacturing city they called "Middletown," coping — reasonably successfully, optimistically and harmoniously — with life's vicissitudes. "Middletown" was in fact Muncie, Ind.

[Not Bob]

Originally posted by Spanky
What is one month of board support? Is that some sort of donation? How much?

Yes. I forget the exact amount, but RT will let us know. Around $150, I think, and it goes for a good cause.

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by Not Bob
Yes. I forget the exact amount, but RT will let us know. Around $150, I think, and it goes for a good cause.

I'll back NotBob on that bet, in case we have multiple takers.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Not Bob
Yes. I forget the exact amount, but RT will let us know. Around $150, I think, and it goes for a good cause.

Your on.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Spanky
Candidate on a High Horse

By George Will

Barack Obama may be exactly what his supporters suppose him to be. Not, however, for reasons most Americans will celebrate.


Obama may be the fulfillment of modern liberalism. Explaining why many working-class voters are "bitter," he said they "cling" to guns, religion and "antipathy to people who aren't like them" because of "frustrations." His implication was that their primitivism, superstition and bigotry are balm for resentments they feel because of America's grinding injustice.


By so speaking, Obama does fulfill liberalism's transformation since Franklin Roosevelt. What had been under FDR a celebration of America and the values of its working people has become a doctrine of condescension toward those people and the supposedly coarse and vulgar country that pleases them.


When a supporter told Adlai Stevenson, the losing Democratic presidential nominee in 1952 and 1956, that thinking people supported him, Stevenson said, "Yes, but I need to win a majority." When another supporter told Stevenson, "You educated the people through your campaign," Stevenson replied, "But a lot of people flunked the course." Michael Barone, in "Our Country: The Shaping of America From Roosevelt to Reagan," wrote: "It is unthinkable that Roosevelt would ever have said those things or that such thoughts ever would have crossed his mind." Barone added: "Stevenson was the first leading Democratic politician to become a critic rather than a celebrator of middle-class American culture — the prototype of the liberal Democrat who would judge ordinary Americans by an abstract standard and find them wanting."


Stevenson, like Obama, energized young, educated professionals for whom, Barone wrote, "what was attractive was not his platform but his attitude." They sought from Stevenson "not so much changes in public policy as validation of their own cultural stance." They especially rejected "American exceptionalism, the notion that the United States was specially good and decent," rather than — in Michelle Obama's words — "just downright mean."


The emblematic book of the new liberalism was "The Affluent Society" by Harvard economist John Kenneth Galbraith. He argued that the power of advertising to manipulate the bovine public is so powerful that the law of supply and demand has been vitiated. Manufacturers can manufacture in the American herd whatever demand the manufacturers want to supply. Because the manipulable masses are easily given a "false consciousness" (another category, like religion as the "opiate" of the suffering masses, that liberalism appropriated from Marxism), four things follow:


First, the consent of the governed, when their behavior is governed by their false consciousnesses, is unimportant. Second, the public requires the supervision of a progressive elite which, somehow emancipated from false consciousness, can engineer true consciousness. Third, because consciousness is a reflection of social conditions, true consciousness is engineered by progressive social reforms. Fourth, because people in the grip of false consciousness cannot be expected to demand or even consent to such reforms, those reforms usually must be imposed, for example, by judicial fiats.


The iconic public intellectual of liberal condescension was Columbia University historian Richard Hofstadter, who died in 1970 but whose spirit still permeated that school when Obama matriculated there in 1981. Hofstadter pioneered the rhetorical tactic that Obama has revived with his diagnosis of working-class Democrats as victims — the indispensable category in liberal theory. The tactic is to dismiss rather than refute those with whom you disagree.


Obama's dismissal is: Americans, especially working-class conservatives, are unable, because of their false consciousness, to deconstruct their social context and embrace the liberal program. Today that program is to elect Obama, thereby making his wife at long last proud of America.


Hofstadter dismissed conservatives as victims of character flaws and psychological disorders — a "paranoid style" of politics rooted in "status anxiety," etc. Conservatism rose on a tide of votes cast by people irritated by the liberalism of condescension.


Obama voiced such liberalism with his "bitterness" remarks to an audience of affluent San Franciscans. Perfect.


When Democrats convened in San Francisco in 1984, en route to losing 49 states, Jeane Kirkpatrick — a former FDR Democrat then serving in the Cabinet of another such, Ronald Reagan — said "San Francisco Democrats" are people who "blame America first." Today they blame Americans for America being "downright mean."


Obama's apology for his embittering sociology of "bitterness" — "I didn't say it as well as I should have" — occurred in Muncie, Ind. Perfect.


In 1929 and 1937, Robert and Helen Lynd published two seminal books of American sociology. They were sympathetic studies of a medium-size manufacturing city they called "Middletown," coping — reasonably successfully, optimistically and harmoniously — with life's vicissitudes. "Middletown" was in fact Muncie, Ind.

To be lectured on elitism by George Will! Oh, the humanity!

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Spanky
If Obama is the nominee it will be an early Christmas gift to the Republicans this year.

I don't think so, Spanky.

As your focus group showed, many people are very easily swayed by the last thing they hear.

If Obama is the nominee, he will have at three+ months to spread his message unimpeded by a primary fight -- and a money machine larger than anything the Democrats have ever had before to do it with.

There will surely be plenty coming from the other side, but Obama is extremely persuasive, and his campaign has shown itself to be very skilled. We will see.

S_A_M

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
To be lectured on elitism by George Will! Oh, the humanity!

Well said. Better than my rant would have been.

P.S. Adlai Stevenson was damn funny.

eta: P.P.S. The idea that Democrats supported Stevenson and support Obama because of their "attitude" and not their platform is as much condescension -- a reverse snobbery -- as the alleged "attitude."

S_A_M

[Adder]

Originally posted by Gattigap
I'll back NotBob on that bet, in case we have multiple takers.

Me too.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
To be lectured on elitism by George Will! Oh, the humanity!

Remember how many of you guys thought the military was made up of uneducated people? Wasn't that sort of a reflection of what will is saying?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
Remember how many of you guys thought the military was made up of uneducated people? Wasn't that sort of a reflection of what will is saying?

I couldn't really follow what Will was saying. I kept getting distracted by the bowtie.

And I was amazed that I got out of the end of the piece before it collapsed of its own contradictions. Maybe my favorite part was the way that Will segued from the paragraph explaining liberals' odd adherence to false consciousness to another explaining that Obama can be explained as a product of the thought of a professor at Columbia who died several years before Obama got there, but whose ideas somehow pervaded the campus. Hmm.