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Captain Richard Koll, left, and Airman 1st Class Mike Eulo perform function checks after launching an MQ-1 Predator unmanned aerial vehicle August 7 at Balad Air Base, Iraq. Captain Koll, the pilot, and Airman Eulo, the sensor operator, will handle the Predator in a radius of approximately 25 miles around the base before handing it off to personnel stationed in the United States to continue its mission. Both are assigned to the 46th Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron. (Via Wikipedia)
“It was in the afternoon around two o’clock and he was on his way to work. They were in a car. A drone struck and four people died in it, including children who were walking on the road. . . . There were lots of drones wandering over that day. They were wandering all over, and as the car passed by, it was targeted.” Tahir told our team, “He was my older brother, and I miss him a lot.”
“[Before, e]verybody was involved in their own labor work. We were all busy. But since
the drone attacks have started, everybody is very scared and everybody is terrorized. . . .
People are out of business, people are out of schools, because people are being killed by
these drone attacks.” Tahir emphasized, “It’s not a [fictional] story. It’s brutality that we
are undergoing and that needs to be stopped.”
~ Tahir Afzal’s brother died in a drone strike. -- "Living Under Drones" (PDF)
News and Opinion
US Peace Activists Challenge Ambassador in Pakistan About Drones
Robert Naiman of Just Foreign Policy and CODEPINK Peace Delegation meet with the Acting US Ambassador to Pakistan, Richard Haogland, in Islamabad on October 3, 2012 to discuss the United States policy on the use of drones strikes in Pakistan.
[Editor's note: Also, please see this important diary on DailyKos by Robert Naiman, Policy Director at Just Foreign Policy. ]
Imran Khan braves march into Pakistan's Taliban heartland
Activists say up to 800 civilians have been killed by drone strikes in tribal areas in recent years
Imran Khan and a group of human-rights activists have vowed to press ahead with a march into Pakistan's remote tribal area to highlight the civilian cost of the American drone missile programme.
The cricketer-turned-politician said he would hold the government of President Asif Ali Zardari responsible if anything happened to those taking part. Mr Khan is tomorrow due to lead a convoy of vehicles into the tribal areas, culminating in a rally in South Waziristan on Sunday night. He is to be accompanied by human-rights campaigners from the US and Pakistan. In recent days, government officials had tried to warn the politician off, suggesting it might not be safe for the large contingent, despite an apparent statement from the Taliban that it would not target the activists.
Last night, campaigners said it was essential they pushed ahead with the plan. Speaking from Islamabad, Medea Benjamin, the co-founder of the US-based Code Pink campaign group, said people were prepared to risk danger to show solidarity with the people of the tribal areas. "We came here to show the people of Pakistan that there are Americans who are totally opposed to the drones and that we will try to put pressure on our government to stop this," she said. "And we are prepared to risk our lives to do this."
The Folly of Drone Attacks and US Strategy
On March 17, 2011 a drone attack killed at least 40 members of a Wazir tribal Jirga, which was resolving a land ownership dispute among sub-tribes in Waziristan, a mountainous region in northwest Pakistan, according to local media reports.
The reports claimed the Jirga was not the intended target and the predator was chasing a car before finally executing five people without any trial or due process near the Jirga. While this predator was hovering in the area, sophisticated cameras allegedly picked up images of a bigger gathering. Without appearing to have any intelligence or knowledge of its target, it fired four more missiles at the congregation
[ ... ]
The first drone attack was carried out in 2004 and had a specific target. This was true for all nine drone attacks that took place until 2007. However, identifying targets became shady as the number of strikes increased. After President Obama's oath of office, the drone attacks saw a sudden surge, accelerating from an average of one strike every 40 days to one every four days by mid-2011, according to the New America Foundation. The TBIJ said available data showed from June 2004 to September 2012, drone strikes have killed 2,570 to 3,337 people in Pakistan, of whom 474 to 884 were civilians -- including 176 children.
As a result of these attacks, the US has only been able to achieve 41 high value targets, according to estimates by the New American Foundation. We have seen that with every assassination of militant leaders, they have been replaced with a more ferocious and extremist leader.
[ ... ]The American public should ask their government who is being killed in their name. Questioning the drone program in light of real facts is not anti-American -- violating the rule of law, due process and the "right to life" is.
Let's shine a light on
this. h/t Kevin Gosztola.
Reuters Reporter’s Hit Job on a Recent Report on US Drone Strikes in Pakistan
A blog post published by Reuters reporter Myra MacDonald and on the internet today highlights a recent report from clinics at Stanford University and New York University and argues the “anti-drone campaign” is doing damage. It has been widely circulated on the internet yet makes a number of dubious or completely disingenuous arguments about critics of drones, which is why it deserves to be deconstructed and examined.
Panetta rejects Karzai criticism of Afghan war effort
(Reuters) - Progress in Afghanistan has cost thousands of military lives and it would be helpful if Afghan President Hamid Karzai expressed gratitude for that sacrifice, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Friday, bluntly rejecting the Afghan leader's recent criticism of the war effort.
[ ... ]
"NATO and Afghanistan should fight this war where terrorism stems from," Karzai said in remarks reported by The New York Times. "But the United States is not ready to go and fight the terrorists there. This shows the double game. They say one thing and do something else."
Film dramatizing bin Laden raid airing Nov. 4
A film dramatizing the death of Osama bin Laden is set to debut next month on the National Geographic Channel, two days before the presidential election.
"Seal Team Six: The Raid on Osama bin Laden," from The Weinstein Co. and Voltage Pictures, will air Sunday, Nov. 4, the channel said Thursday. President Barack Obama faces Republican challenger Mitt Romney at the polls two days later.
Weinstein co-chairman Harvey Weinstein is a prominent fundraiser for Obama's re-election campaign, which has touted bin Laden's death as an example of the president's leadership.
Turkey warns Syria more strikes would be fatal mistake
(Reuters) - Turkey's prime minister said on Friday his country did not want war but warned Syria not to make a "fatal mistake" by testing its resolve, and its army retaliated for a third day running after more mortar rounds from Syria landed on its soil.
[ ... ]
"We are not interested in war, but we're not far from war either. This nation has come to where it is today having gone through intercontinental wars," Erdogan said in his speech.
"Those who attempt to test Turkey's deterrence, its decisiveness, its capacity, I say here they are making a fatal mistake."
Syria's Kurds flock to Iraq to prepare for Assad's onslaught
In secret training camps in the mountains and plains of northern Iraq, Kurdish Syrian army defectors are being drilled to protect the oil-rich areas in the north-east of their home country, which have so far managed to avoid being dragged into the civil war. Hundreds of Syrian Kurds are training with Iraq's Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Peshmerga forces, and there are plans to send the men back to protect the Kurdish regions of Syria should clashes break out in those areas with the government or the rebel Free Syrian Army (FSA).
Counterparties: Hyperinflation is so hot right now (in Iran)
Terrifyingly, the black-market (i.e., realistic) value of the rial recently dropped 60% in eight days. Tougher sanctions in part explain the sudden drop. The US, for its part, seems increasingly unwilling to allow Western financial institutions to pal around with the Iranian regime. Any further reduction in the access Iran’s central bank has to global financial markets would put further pressure on the rial.
[ ... ]
Further sanctions from the EU appear imminent. And that could cause a jittery Iranian regime to pull out the biggest bargaining chip it currently has by closing the Straight of Hormuz. More broadly, Jay Newton-Small rounds up the three most likely outcomes — regime change, a push for greater nuclear capabilities or economic collapse — none of which are particularly heartening.
Sanctions hurt Syria and Iran but regimes can ride on regardless
One of the small but immensely wealthy states which may suffer from Iran's crisis is Dubai
Thus have sanctions struck at the heart of Iran's economy in advance of the collapse of the rial. This catastrophe will hurt the poor and the middle classes rather than the regime's supporters and the very wealthy who have always had access to dollar accounts. One Iranian university professor, for instance – no supporter of the regime – was about to purchase a $400,000 home in Toronto before emigrating with his family to Canada. He now has less that $200,000 in rials in his Tehran bank; his dreams have ended.
But do sanctions – or economic collapse – bring down Arab regimes? They have failed, so far, to destroy the Syrian government. Years of sanctions never crushed Gaddafi. Nor, after years of banking blockades and oil sanctions, has Iran's government folded. True, members of the regime are using the new economic crisis to damage President Ahmedinejad but there is no mass movement in Iran to overthrow the Islamic Republic, and certainly no desire to restore the monarchy.
NEW 4-Mile Long Oil Slick Near BP’s Gulf Oil Well
CNN reports:
An oil sheen about four miles long has appeared in the Gulf of Mexico near the site of the worst oil spill in U.S. history, a Coast Guard spokesman said Thursday.
It was not immediately clear where the oil is coming from, said Petty Officer 3rd Class Ryan Tippets. [Although previous oil has been matched as a "dead ringer" to the BP well.]
Coast Guardsmen went to the location after seeing the oil on a satellite image, Tippets said. The response team collected samples and sent them to the Coast Guard Marine Safety Lab in Connecticut for testing.
*
The sheen is near the spot where, on April 20, 2010, BP’s Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded over the Macondo well, killing 11 workers and spewing oil that spread across a huge portion of the Gulf.
As we’ve noted for years, BP’s Macondo oil well is still leaking … and will leak for years.
Gap between college tuition and consumer income is at record levels
This is another market distortion created by the US government (similar to the housing market) by providing an almost unlimited amount of credit and pricing it below market. It allowed schools to raise tuition without the demand constraint that would normally exist in a market. As a result the US consumer student loan burden is now higher than either auto or credit card debt (see discussion). And now we are also seeing a rise in delinquencies (see post).
Simpson-Bowles make their comeback
Simpson and Bowles are having another national moment.
Fifty-eight million Americans saw President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney tangle over former Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.) and former White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles’s deficit reduction plan. “Simpson-Bowles” was the most popular Google search during the 90-minute debate.
[ ... ]
But behind the scenes, the two deficit hawks are enjoying more than just a search engine moment. The pair is heading to Virginia’s Mount Vernon next week to meet with the new bipartisan Senate “Gang of Eight” in an effort to hash out a major deficit and tax package.
Inside the Capitol, there’s an increasing recognition that any major deficit deal will at least need the imprimatur of Simpson and Bowles in order to win over votes from both sides of the aisle.
Corporate CEOs Unveil Obama’s Second Term Agenda: Cutting Entitlements and Endless Fracking
In July, I pointed out that Obama’s second term agenda was to cut Medicare, Social Security, and/or Medicaid. And here comes the cavalry to make that a reality.
[ ... ]
There’s a lot of risk here. Let’s say that boosting the housing market by restricting supply doesn’t work. Or that the fracking boom doesn’t pan out the way that CEOs think it will. Or that Europe isn’t contained. Or any number of other possible problems come to pass, such as crop failures, climate shocks, a Chinese slowdown, a pandemic, a supply chain shock, etc. Then we may be heading to what’s going on in Spain and Greece, which is massive protests and an authoritarian crackdown in response to brutal austerity. And if the plan works, then we’ll get there eventually, it’ll just take a few more years. As Obama put it, according to Bob Woodward, “I’m a blue dog. I want fiscal restraint and order.”
It’s still the liquidation of society versus the global labor revival.
Yoda worm brings Star Wars to the deep sea
The Jedi acorn worm joins a horse fly named after Beyoncé and a trio of slime mold beetles named after Republicans
The pint-sized Star Wars character joins a long list of other famous people and characters who have had a new species named after them, including afish parasite named after Bob Marley; a horse fly named after Beyoncé and a trio of slime-mold beetles named after George Bush, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld.
Blog Posts and Tweets of Interest
The Evening Blues - 10-5-12
Americans Press U.S. Ambassador for End to Drone Strikes in Pakistan, and the Ambassador Responds by Robert Naiman, Policy Director at Just Foreign Policy
Protest Song of the Day: ‘Karma Debt’ by The Mynabirds
Banks Take Advantage of HARP Refinancing, Generate Huge Profits
The Senate Report on Fusion Center Fails to Ask or Answer the Most Basic Question
The Quickie FBI Visit to Benghazi and the Arrests in Turkey
Rare event: Transwoman wins battle with insurance carrier
Rise Against - Prayer Of The Refugee
Critical thinking, to a large extent, has been banned or abandoned in the progressive blogosphere.
Our new site is a place where independent views and critical thought flourish.
"Too often we... enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought."
~ John F. Kennedy
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