2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumThe reason Hillary will not be indicted is the same reason Bush et al. were not tried for war crimes
When was the last time power in our country got justly punished?
shraby
(21,946 posts)JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)posting that nonsense.
You'll hurt something.
wildeyed
(11,243 posts)False cause straight into a loaded question, with no preamble of anything! And added a little flourish with the Biblical-sounding language. "Justly"
trudyco
(1,258 posts)I think there should be no statue of limitations on Politicians.
HERVEPA
(6,107 posts)George II
(67,782 posts)JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)Maybe. What's a felony charge on keeping secrets, compared to destroying whole nations?
George II
(67,782 posts)reddread
(6,896 posts)accountability is rare animal, and when the crooks get a little carefree, something might catch up to them.
but how hard? people like our previous sheriff were given the option of not running again.
rather than really paying the price of his mistakes. I can see in other states where similar transgressions were met harshly. so it depends who is in good with who, and how much they can leverage their assets against a prosecution.
it is all about money.
if only a little of it was about justice.
JI7
(89,249 posts)Is it because he is part of the powerful ?
2banon
(7,321 posts)what a weird question. As if Sanders ever called for Hillary to be indicted.
JI7
(89,249 posts)Dem2
(8,168 posts)it's a mind-numbing comparison, beyond the pale.
Of course, she voted for the Bush "violations." And are you at least a little bit mad about Libya?
I was happy to see Qaddafi taken out by his people - they put up with enough of his dictatorial murder over many decades.
HERVEPA
(6,107 posts)They got what they wanted, governing is difficult.
I'll never shed a tear for a terrorist murdering dictator.
JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)Dem2
(8,168 posts)Try to stay on point next time
JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)You use "murderous dictator" as an excuse for abusing U.S. military power to destroy the nation of Libya, a move pushed for above all by HRC and with such horrific consequences ever since that Obama calls the lack of a plan his worst policy failure.
In doing so you also insinuate falsely that someone who condemns the destruction of Libya "sheds a tear" for Gaddafi, using a common logical fallacy to distract away from the point. (One can condemn Gaddafi and yet not support the 2011 U.S. military action.)
And that is the same fallacious excuse used by those who defended the Bush administration for its crime in Iraq (and has also been used in defending Clinton's vote in favor of that crime).
So you're not a Gaddafi lover, but, by your logic, if you condemn the 2003 invasion of Iraq, are you a Saddam lover? Do you shed tears for him?
Dem2
(8,168 posts)End of story.
polly7
(20,582 posts)western aided rebels waited, and tortured, beat and sodomized him with a bayonet in the street. I saw it live. We wouldn't allow a dog to be treated that way, yet some here actually celebrated the details. It was quite sickening. Almost as sickening as seeing the lies day after day that led to the whole atrocity.
Dem2
(8,168 posts)I had no control over the rebels behavior. He still deserved to be executed 100x over, so I'm not shedding a tear for him. Only Hillary haters coddle terrorist leaders who were killed by their own people after decades of subjugation.
polly7
(20,582 posts)and cheer on the never-ending western engineered brutal coups that caused Qaddafi supporters and African workers to be hung in the streets, burned alive, raped, tortured and murdered defend Clinton's underhanded and secretive actions against a sovereign nation where people lived a higher standard of living than any other in the region.
How about the western trained 'Prime Minister' and radical tribal members who had long hated Qaddafi and the Jamahiriya gov't for not allowing their fundamentalist fanaticism and who were chosen, paid and pushed to start the 'rebellion'.
If you think Clinton - well aware of PNAC, the 'seven countries in five years' plan didn't know exactly how Libya was long planned for 'regime change', you weren't paying attention.
Start here:
Exposed: The "Humanitarian" War In Libya
Check this out - 'The Humanitarian War' = http://www.laguerrehumanitaire.fr/english It's horrifying. (Videos now here - I watched them on the original site when all of it was happening and posted these here at DU) http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article29428.htm
Must watch videos, the western trained NTC 'Prime Minister' - 'word to ear!' was the source of the 'data (all unofficial and lies, of course) that led to the UN resolution.
A bunch of LIES submitted to the ICC ..... by the UN - who got their 'numbers and crimes' from the western trained NTC Prime Minister - 'word to ear'. Pages and pages redacted.
No Evidence? No Problem!!
How the CIA Used "Libyan Expatriates" To Engineer Consent For Regime Change
One of the main sources for the claim that Qaddafi was killing his own people is the Libyan League for Human Rights (LLHR), an organization linked to the International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH). On Feb. 21, 2011, LLHR General Secretary Dr. Sliman Bouchuiguir initiated a petition in collaboration with the organization U.N. Watch and the National Endowment for Democracy. This petition was signed by more than 70 NGOs.
Then a few days later, on Feb. 25, Dr. Bouchuiguir went to the U.N. Human Rights Council in order to expose the allegations concerning the crimes of Qaddafis government. In July 2011 we went to Geneva to interview Dr. Sliman Bouchuiguir.
"How to circumvent international law and justice 101." - originally published by http://laguerrehumanitaire.fr
A film by Julien Teil
Official Website:
http://laguerrehumanitaire.fr
Official web:
http://thehumanitarianwar.com
Official TV:
http://laguerrehumanitaire-film.rutube.ru/
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What you don't know about the Libyan crisis: (watch the timeline closely)
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The horror of Libya - to fulfill the PNAC objective of overthrowing yet another country. "7 countries in 5 years!" This was NO "Humanitarian Intervention", and certainly not for all those migrants Qaddafi had allowed in over decades, Qaddafi loyalists and others who were raped, tortured, mutilated, hung, burned to death .... all known of by the NATO 'humanitarian team'.
It was a bullshit, self-serving, western funded and backed coup against yet another sovereign nation not yet indebted to the IMF and controlling its own resources, not to mention not allowing U.S. bases 'Africom' into all of Africa.
Some of these links don't work anymore, but read and discover just what a sham this was and why. The video at the end is particularly interesting.
The Untold Story in Libya
Posted by polly7 in General Discussion
Tue Oct 18th 2011, 10:06 AM
In May 2010, Libya was voted on to the UN Human Rights Council by a huge majority. The UN Watch's campaign to remove Libya from the Human Rights Council began immediately.
In March, 2011, a report, containing positive quotes from UN diplomatic delegations in many countries, was due to be presented by the UN Human Rights Council, leading to a Resolution commending Libya's progress in a wide aspect of human rights (listed in the article). March 19, 2011, the attack on Libya began.
Libya was one of only five countries without a Rothschild model central bank, Quaddafi openly discussed, in 2009, the nationalization of US, UK, Germany, Spain, Norway, Canada and Italy's oil companies, switching to the gold dinar - a single African currency that would serve as an alternative to the U.S. dollar and allow African nations to share the wealth. Libya has an abundance of water - Gaddafis Great Man-Made River Project project offers limitless amounts of water for Libyans and would allow them to be totally self-sufficient. In the near-future, water will be the next resource equated with money and power, other countries may be dependent on its reserves. A self-sufficient, dictator-ruled nation with control over some of the worlds most precious resource waves a big red warning flag.
In 2010 Gaddafi made a motion to the UN General Assembly to investigate the circumstances of the invasion of Iraq. He was also wasting the west's ....... 'libya's' oil on free education, housing, tolerance of immigrants, raising the standard of living in Africa, lowering infant mortality while raising life expectancy.
Many of these things are completely similar to what we learned of Iraq.
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Global Civilians For Peace In Libya
Posted on November 9, 2011 by globalciviliansforpeace
When analysing the standard of living in Libya it is important to put the achievements into context. During the 1950s under the leadership of King Idris, Libya was among the poorest nations in the world with some of the lowest living standards. From the early 1980s until 2003 Libya were placed under crippling sanctions by the US and UN which had the result of strangling Libyas growing economy leading to an inevitable smothering of development projects and social welfare schemes. Despite this The Libyan Arab Jamahiriya had achieved the highest living standard in Africa. Libya has also invested heavily in African development initiatives. The funding of infrastructure projects as well as African political and financial institutions was aimed at developing Africa independently and combating the economic exploitation of African resources and labour by outside powers. On January 4th, 2011 just weeks before the conflict in Libya started UN members praised Libyas continued welfare provision and commitment to upholding human rights.
Public Health Care
Public Health Care in Libya prior to NATOs Humanitarian Intervention was the best in Africa. Health care is [was] available to all citizens free of charge by the public sector. The country boasts the highest literacy and educational enrolment rates in North Africa. The Government is [was] substantially increasing the development budget for health services . (WHO Libya Country Brief )
According to the World Health Organization (WHO): Life expectancy at birth was 72.3 years (2009), among the highest in the developing World.
Under 5 mortality rate per 1000 live births declined from 71 in 1991 to 14 in 2009
(http://www.who.int/countryfocus/cooperation_strategy/ccsbrief_lby_en.pdf)
Education
The adult literacy rate was of the order of 89%, (2009), (94% for males and 83% for females). 99.9% of youth are literate (UNESCO 2009 figures, See UNESCO, Libya Country Report)
Gross primary school enrolment ratio was 97% for boys and 97% for girls (2009) .
(see UNESCO tables at http://stats.uis.unesco.org/unesco/TableViewer/document.aspx?ReportId=121&IF_Language=eng&BR_Country=4340&BR_Region=40525
[Extract]
21 February 2011
During Muammar Gaddafis 42-year rule, Libya has made great strides socially and economically thanks to its vast oil income, but tribes and clans continue to be part of the demographic landscape.
Women in Libya are free to work and to dress as they like, subject to family constraints. Life expectancy is in the seventies. And per capita income while not as high as could be expected given Libyas oil wealth and relatively small population of 6.5m is estimated at $12,000 (£9,000), according to the World Bank.
Illiteracy has been almost wiped out, as has homelessness a chronic problem in the pre-Gaddafi era, where corrugated iron shacks dotted many urban centres around the country.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/mobile/world-middle-east-12528996
Proud nation
In August 1984, Muammar Al Qadhafi laid the foundation stone for the pipe production plant at Brega. The Great Man-Made River Project had begun.
Click here to see a map of the pipeline network
Libya had oil money to pay for the project, but it did not have the technical or engineering expertise for such a massive undertaking.
Foreign companies from South Korea, Turkey, Germany, Japan, the Philippines and the UK were invited to help.
Water is seen as key to the countrys future prosperity
It is hard to fault the Libyans on their commitment. They estimate that when the Great Man-Made River is completed, they will have spent almost $20bn. So far, that money has bought 5,000km of pipeline that can transport 6.5 million cubic metres of water a day from over 1,000 desert wells.
As a result, Libya is now a world leader in hydrological engineering, and it wants to export its expertise to other African and Middle-Eastern countries facing the same problems with their water.
Through its agriculture, Libya hopes to gain a foothold in Europes consumer market.
But the Great Man-Made River Project is much more than an extraordinary piece of engineering.
Adam Kuwairi argues that the success of the Great Man-Made River Project has increased Libyas standing in the world: Its another addition to our independence; it gives us the confidence to survive.
https://globalciviliansforpeace.wordpress.com/2011/11/09/the-standard-of-living-in-libya/
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Yes, simply put, Nato's member nations are trying to steer back Libya Central Bank into the mainstream financial structure, under the watching eyes of the World Bank and the International Monetary Funds, to provide (reconstruction) funds to Libya with hefty interests payments - and transform a country which was free of debts into a heavily indebted country - as done everywhere else in sub-Saharan African countries.
http://businessafrica.net/africabiz/graphs...
http://businessafrica.net/africabiz/arcvol...
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From a 'no fly zone to all out bombing of targets called out by rebels'. NATO's high-precision bombing preceeded 'rebel' incursions.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/MH27Ak03.html
"It's now common knowledge that British SAS, French intelligence, US Central Intelligence Agency assets, Qatar special forces and mercenaries of all stripes were parachuted as boots on the ground for months, planning and training the "rebels" and in close coordination with that philanthropic prodigy, NATO.
That was never the UN mandate - but who cares? NATO/GCC paid the bills, NATO conducted the bombing and NATO/GCC will "stabilize" the mess, according to a 70-page plan leaked by the British to Rupert Murdoch'sz Times of London."
"Expect local - and global - fireworks as far as grabbing the loot is concerned. Without even considering the (still unexplored) oil and gas wealth, Libya's foreign assets are worth at least $150 billion. Libya's central bank, now about to be privatized, has no less than 143.8 tons of gold. Then there's at least a millennium supply of fresh water, which had started to be harnessed by Gaddafi via the spectacular, multibillion dollar Great Man-Made River (GMR) project."
Middle East
Aug 27, 2011
THE ROVING EYE
R2P is now Right 2 Plunder
By Pepe Escobar
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"Oil-rich but with a relatively small population of 6.6. million, Gadhafi's Libya welcomed hundreds of thousands of black Africans looking for work in recent decades. "
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/01/l...
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NATOs War on Libya is an Attack on African DevelopmentDan Glazebrook
6 09 2011
http://globalciviliansforpeace.com/tag/afr... /
To prevent this threat of African development, the Europeans and the USA have responded in the only way they know how militarily. Four years ago, the US set up a new command and control centre for the military subjugation of the Africa, called AFRICOM. The problem for the US was that no African country wanted to host them; indeed, until very recently, Africa was unique in being the only continent in the world without a US military base. And this fact is in no small part, thanks to the efforts of the Libyan government.
Before Gaddafis revolution deposed the British-backed King Idris in 1969, Libya had hosted one of the worlds biggest US airbases, the Wheelus Air Base; but within a year of the revolution, it had been closed down and all foreign military personnel expelled.
More recently, Gaddafi had been actively working to scupper AFRICOM. African governments that were offered money by the US to host a base were typically offered double by Gaddafi to refuse it, and in 2008 this ad-hoc opposition crystallised into a formal rejection of AFRICOM by the African Union.
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The force used by the occupier to displace the old regime always makes sure the new regime is supine and complaint. The National Transitional Council, made up of former Gadhafi loyalists, Islamists and tribal leaders, many of whom detest each other, will be the Wests vehicle for the reconfiguration of Libya. Libya will return to being the colony it was before Gadhafi and the other young officers in 1969 ousted King Idris, who among other concessions had let Standard Oil write Libyas petroleum laws. Gadhafis defiance of Western commercial interests, which saw the nationalization of foreign banks and foreign companies, along with the oil industry, as well as the closure of U.S. and British air bases, will be reversed. The despotic and collapsed or collapsing regimes in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and Syria once found their revolutionary legitimacy in the pan-Arabism of Egypts Gamal Abdel Nasser. But these regimes fell victim to their own corruption, decay and brutality. None were worth defending. Their disintegration, however, heralds a return of the corporate and imperial power that spawned figures like Nasser and will spawn his radical 21st century counterparts.
Libya: Here We Go Again
Monday 5 September 2011
by: Chris Hedges, Truthdig | Op-Ed
http://www.truthout.com/libya-here-we-go-a...
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LIBYA: Rebels execute black immigrants while forces kidnap others
http://somalilandpress.com/libya-rebels-ex...
"Many Africans have virtually nothing after years in Libya, many have been looted, robbed, while others saw their living quarters and apartments go in flames. Now they are praying to God to send them home.
While the international leaders are busy drafting resolutions to dismantle Muammar Gaddafi, the African Union has not yet commented on the situation in Libya.
Meanwhile, the International Criminal Court is said to have started a formal inquiry into possible crimes against humanity in Libya that will investigate the Libyan regime."
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JohnPilger.com
8 September 2011
http://johnpilger.com/articles/hail-to-the...
..."I quote that not so much for its Orwellian quality but as a model of journalism's role in justifying "our" bloodbaths in advance.
This is Rupert's Revolution, after all. Gone from the Murdoch press are pejorative "insurgents". The action in Libya, says The Times, is "a revolution... as revolutions used to be". That it is a coup by a gang of Muammar Gaddafi's ex cronies and spooks in collusion with Nato is hardly news.
The self-appointed "rebel leader", Mustafa Abdul Jalil, was Gaddafi's feared justice minister. The CIA runs or bankrolls most of the rest, including America's old friends, the Mujadeen Islamists who spawned al-Qaeda.
They told journalists what they needed to know: that Gaddafi was about to commit "genocide", of which there was no evidence, unlike the abundant evidence of "rebel" massacres of black African workers falsely accused of being mercenaries. European bankers' secret transfer of the Central Bank of Libya from Tripoli to "rebel" Benghazi by European bankers in order to control the country's oil billions was an epic heist of little .
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Sirte a 'living hell,' says aid group
http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/news/co...
Tuesday 04 October 2011 by Our Foreign Desk Printable Email
A Red Cross team finally entered the besieged Libyan town of Sirte yesterday and delivered urgently needed surgical supplies to treat about 200 wounded people.
Nato has repeatedly targeted Sirte in its seven-month bombing campaign that enabled armed rebels to topple the government of Muammar Gadaffi and gain control of most of the oil-rich state.
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Absolutely horrible to use rape as a propaganda weapon for war, while ignoring the reality of it for all those brutalized, raped and some, murdered by the NATO supported 'rebels' - just one example of their many atrocities.
********* http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x2174087 **********
http://andrewgavinmarshall.com/2011/08/26/lies-war-and-empire-natos-humanitarian-imperialism-in-libya
In early March of 2011, news headlines in Western nations reported that Gaddafi would kill half a million people.
<1> On March 18, as the UN agreed to launch air strikes on Libya, it was reported that Gaddafi had begun an assault against the rebel-held town of Benghazi. The Daily Mail reported that Gaddafi had threatened to send in his African mercenaries to crush the rebellion.<2> Reports of Libyan government tanks sitting outside Benghazi poised for an invasion were propagated in the Western media.<3> In the lead-up to the United Nations imposing a no-fly zone, reports spread rapidly through the media of Libyan government jets bombing the rebels.<4> Even in February, the New York Times the sacred temple for the stenographers of power we call journalists reported that Gaddafi was amassing thousands of mercenaries to defend Tripoli and crush the rebels.<5>
Italys Foreign Minister declared that over 1,000 people were killed in the fighting in February, citing the number as credible.<6> Even a top official with Human Rights Watch declared the rebels to be peaceful protesters who are nice, sincere people who want a better future for Libya.<7> The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights declared that thousands of people were likely killed by Gaddafi, and called for international intervention to protect civilians.<8> In April, reports spread near and far at lightning speed of Gaddafis forces using rape as a weapon of war, with the first sentence in a Daily Mail article declaring, Children as young as eight are being raped in front of their families by Gaddafis forces in Libya, with Gaddafi handing out Viagra to his troops in a planned and organized effort to promote rape.<9>
As it turned out, these claims as posterity notes turned out to be largely false and contrived. Doctors Without Borders and Amnesty International both investigated the claims of rape, and have found no first-hand evidence in Libya that rapes are systematic and being used as part of war strategy, and their investigations in Eastern Libya have not turned up significant hard evidence supporting allegations of rapes by Qaddafis forces. Yet, just as these reports came out, Hillary Clinton declared that the U.S. is deeply concerned by reports of wide-scale rape in Libya.<10> Even U.S. military and intelligence officials had to admit that, there is no evidence that Libyan military forces are being given Viagra and engaging in systematic rape against women in rebel areas; at the same time Susan Rice, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, told a closed-door meeting of officials at the UN that the Libyan military is using rape as a weapon in the war with the rebels and some had been issued the anti-impotency drug. She reportedly offered no evidence to backup the claim.<
Untrue, says US
US says Gadhafi troops issued Viagra, raping victims
Allegation suggests troops encouraged to turn to sexual violence, envoys say
By Louis Charbonneau
updated 4/28/2011 9:31:26 PM ET
UNITED NATIONS The U.S. envoy to the United Nations told the Security Council Thursday that troops loyal to Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi were increasingly engaging in sexual violence and some had been issued the impotency drug Viagra, diplomats said.
Several U.N. diplomats who attended a closed-door Security Council meeting on Libya told Reuters that U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice raised the Viagra issue in the context of increasing reports of sexual violence by Gadhafi's troops.
"Rice raised that in the meeting but no one responded," a diplomat said on condition of anonymity. The allegation was first reported by a British newspaper.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42809612/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa#.TqXeG96ImU8
US intel: No evidence of Viagra as weapon in Libya
http://www.msnbc .msn.com/id/42824884/ns/world_news-mide...
UN Ambassador Rice reportedly had said drug was being used in systematic rapes
NBC News and news services updated 4/29/2011 1:52:00 PM ET
UNITED NATIONS There is no evidence that Libyan military forces are being given Viagra and engaging in systematic rape against women in rebel areas, US military and intelligence officials told NBC News on Friday.
Diplomats said Thursday that US Ambassador Susan Rice told a closed-door meeting of officials at the UN that the Libyan military is using rape as a weapon in the war with the rebels and some had been issued the anti- impotency drug. She reportedly offered no evidence to backup the claim.
While rape has been a weapon of choice in many other African conflicts, the US officials say they've seen no such reports out of Libya.
[URL=.html][IMG][/IMG][/URL]
The gap between Hillary Rodham Clinton's rhetoric warning of a Rwanda-like slaughter of civilians in Libya and the facts gathered by career intelligence staff is taking on significance as the former secretary of state prepares another bid for the White House and her national security credentials are re-examined. (Associated Press)
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http://www.democraticunderground.com/discu...
bvar22:
The Untold Story in Libya:
How The West Cooked Up The People's Uprising
http://whowhatwhy.com/2011/08/31/now-that-... ... /
The Global Disaster Capitalists never let a good disaster go to waste.
In the case of Libya, they used their Enforcement Arm (NATO & The US Military) to CREATE a disaster where there was none.
For all his dictatorial megalomania, Gaddafi is a committed pan-African - a fierce defender of African unity. Libya was not in debt to international bankers. It did not borrow cash from the International Monetary Fund for any "structural adjustment". It used oil money for social services - including the Great Man Made River project, and investment/aid to sub-Saharan countries. Its independent central bank was not manipulated by the Western financial system. All in all a very bad example for the developing world.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/M...
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Libya: Oil, Banks, Water, the United Nations, and Americas Holy Crusade by Felicity Arbuthnot
Posted on April 5, 2011 by dandelionsalad
.."The country was commended: for the progress made in the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, namely universal primary education (and) firm commitment (to) health care. There was praise for cooperation with international organizations in combating human trafficking and corruption .. and for cooperation with the International Organization for Migration.
Progress in enjoyment of economic and social rights, including in the areas of education, health care, poverty reduction and social welfare with measures taken to promote transparency, were also cited. Malaysia: Commended the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya for being party to a significant number of international and regional human rights instruments. Promotion: of the rights of persons with disabilities and praise for measures taken with regard to low income families, were cited...
.."So how does the all tie together? Libya, in March being praised by the Majority of the UN., for human rights progress across the board, to being the latest, bombarded international pariah? A nations destruction enshrined in a UN., Resolution?
The answer lies in part with the Geneva based UN Watch.(vii) UN Watch is : a non-governmental organization whose mandate is to monitor the performance of the United Nations. With Consultative Status to the UN Economic and Social Council, with ties to the UN Department of Public Information, UN Watch is affiliated with the American Jewish Committee. (AJC.)"
http://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2011/0... /
Interesting ..... the involvement in HR Watch of persons whose core values include securing energy resources.
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leveymg (34,352 posts)
9. Evidence State Dept was involved in organizing the rebellion from early April '11
This latest tranche of withheld and redacted "personal" emails from Sidney Blumenthal to Secretary Clinton shows he was part of efforts to overthrow the Ghadaffi regime from nearly the beginning, working as a liaison between the USG, western corporations, and Blackwater-type mercenaries to train and coordinate the uprising. The NYT summarizes some of his April 2011 email to Clinton this way:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/19/us/politics/what-sidney-blumenthals-memos-to-hillary-clinton-said-and-how-they-were-handled.html
Clinton Says Idea on Rebels Should Be Considered
In April 2011, Mr. Blumenthal sent Mrs. Clinton a memo about the rebel forces fighting the regime of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi. The rebels, Mr. Blumenthal wrote, were considering hiring security contractors to train their forces. Mrs. Clinton forwarded the memo to her aide, Jake Sullivan, and said that the idea should be considered. (Pages 1-3)
In 2011 and 2012, Mrs. Clinton forwarded 18 memos to Mr. Sullivan, who in turn circulated them to senior State Department officials, including Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, who was killed in the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, and Ambassador Gene A. Cretz, who preceded him.
Doesn't sound comical or non-lethal to me. But, what it shows is that by early April, the State Dept. had already taken the lead, at least publicly, in aiding the Libyan opposition. The President didn't authorize "non-lethal" aid until April 26th, and that, we were told at the time, did not include training the rebels: http://foreignpolicy.com/2011/05/11/libyan-rebels-get-first-tranche-of-u-s-aid-10000-mres/
"This shipment, authorized under the Presidents April 26th drawdown, consisted of more than 10,000 halal meals ready to eat, so-called MREs, that were transferred from Department of Defense stocks in support of the s efforts to protect civilians and civilian-populated areas under the threat of attack," State Department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters at Tuesdays briefing.
The meals are part of the $25 million in non-lethal aid to the Libyan rebels the White House approved on April 26. That approval came 11 days after the State Department notified Congress that it wanted to spend the funds to help the Libyan rebel army fight off the forces of Col. Muammar al-Qaddafi.
"One of the reasons why I announced $25 million in non-lethal aid yesterday, why many of our partners both in NATO and in the broader Contact Group are providing assistance to the opposition, is to enable them to defend themselves and to repulse the attacks by Qaddafi forces," Clinton said April 21.
But while the State Departments notification said the money would go to things like "vehicles, fuel trucks and fuel bladders, ambulances, medical equipment, protective vests, binoculars, and non-secure radios" all items identified by the Libyan oppositions Transitional National Council (TNC) as urgently needed now the list is much more weighted to humanitarian goods.
Toner said Tuesday that the shipments were meant to be in "support of the TNCs efforts to protect civilians and civilian-populated areas under the threat of attack." More items are en route to Benghazi, including medical supplies, uniforms, boots, tents, and personal protective gear, he said.
"We continue to work with the TNC to determine what additional assistance requirements we might be able to support in the coming weeks," said Toner.
In fact, by the time the State Department acknowledged the delivery of "non-lethal" US aid to Libya, special emissary Chris Stevens had already settled in in Benghazi, where he immediately commenced coordination of US assistance to rebel groups. Plans were clearly afoot by April 1 to send Stevens to Eastern Libya, and the danger posed by by US aid to Jihadist extremist groups being doled out by arriving State Dept. personnel. The Department briefing ended on this ominous note: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2011/04/159596.htm
MR. TONER: Im not sure I know how to answer that question. I mean, look, these are professional diplomats who are conducting these kinds of outreaches, and so these are theyre used to assessing political environments and political opposition groups, and their judgment is sound. Is that it?
QUESTION: Is the State Department envoys already on ground in the eastern part of (inaudible)?
MR. TONER: Im sorry, the State Department?
QUESTION: (Inaudible).
MR. TONER: Not yet.
QUESTION: Not yet.
Three weeks later, at a April 21 press briefing, State Dept. spokesman Mark Toner alluded to the release of the $25 tranche of US aid to opposition groups in that eastern Libyan city: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2011/04/161440.htm#LIBYA
A few questions later, Toner responded to a second question about Stevens and the State Department team that had arrived in Benghazi:
MR. TONER: Thats a good question. Im not sure how big the DART team is there. Is that what youre talking about in addition to Chris Stevens?
QUESTION: Yeah.
MR. TONER: Ill have to confirm that figure. Sorry, Ill get back to you, Josh.
Note that, as the NYT reported, Blumenthal's emails to Clinton were routed to Stevens, among other Department officials assigned to Libya. This would indicate that both Clinton and Stevens were aware of private contractor plans to train opposition militias.
In addition, Blumenthal's emails to Hillary confirm what he had learned about the activities of the military and intelligence services of Egypt, Qatar, Britain and France in providing direct military assistance to the rebels, and MI6's ongoing mechanizations to replace the regime with figures backed by London.
In an April 8 email to Clinton, titled in part, "Egypt moves in", Blumenthal describes the intervention of Egyptian special forces in the civil war, and the their training and equipping of the opposition. He also explicitly warned about the danger in Libya of the rise of the very same al-Qaeda groups that would later coalesce into ISIS: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/05/19/us/politics/libya-related-messages-hillary-clinton-email-account.html?action=click&contentCollection=Politics&module=RelatedCoverage®ion=Marginalia&pgtype=article
Here, Sid references a meeting he had earlier that day with a member of the opposition:
According the UK Telegraph, Blumenthal had an active line of information into "UK game playing" in the uprising and plans to "break up" Libya, news that he passed on to Secretary Clinton. Not surprisingly, this email was also withheld: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/hillary-clinton/11616018/Britain-hid-secret-MI6-plan-to-break-up-Libya-from-US-Hillary-Clinton-told-by-confidante.html
Sidney Blumenthal, a long-time friend of the Clintons, emailed Mrs Clinton on her personal account to warn her that Britain was "game playing" in Libya.
Mr Blumenthal had no formal role in the US State Department and his memos to Mrs Clinton were sourced to his own personal contacts in the Middle East and Europe.
Nevertheless, Mrs Clinton seems to have taken some of his reports seriously and forwarded them on to senior diplomats working at the highest levels of American foreign policy.
The first of Mr Blumenthal's Libya memos - which were leaked to the New York Times - was sent on April 8, 2011, as rebel forces struggled to make gains against Gaddafi's troops, and had "UK game playing" in the subject line.
On April 21, the first known report of intervention on the side of the rebels by foreign "mercenary" forces from Egypt was published: http://www.eurasiareview.com/21022011-civil-war-in-libya-gaddafi-uses-pak-and-bd-mercenaries/ Three weeks later, the Washington Post reported that Qatar was training and equipping the rebellion's militias in Eastern Libya, as well as conducting airstrikes. http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle-east/qatari-military-advisers-on-the-ground-helping-libyan-rebels-get-into-shape/2011/05/11/AFZsPV1G_story.html
Why wouldn't Hillary want to withhold this and related email? Think about it.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=1128037
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Two Nato missiles forced the group to leave the cars and escape on foot, seeking shelter in a drainage ditch. A bodyguard hurled grenades at approaching militiamen but one grenade "hit the concrete wall and bounced back to fall between Muammar Gaddafi and Abu Bakr Younis", Younis junior said.
"The shrapnel hit my father and he fell down to the ground. Muammar Gaddafi was also injured by the grenade, on the left side of his head," he said.
New York-based Human Rights Watch said Gaddafi was already bleeding from head wounds caused by blast shrapnel as he tried to flee Sirte, his hometown.
The charity obtained unedited mobile footage that showed militia fighters abusing Gaddafi as they took him into custody in October 2011.
"As he was being led on to the main road, a militiaman stabbed him in his anus with what appears to have been a bayonet, causing another rapidly bleeding wound," the report said.
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/gaddafi-killed-bayonet-stab-anus-libya-395224
The Grand finale - sodomized with a bayonet, beaten, tortured and murdered in the street - "We came, we saw ....... he died, lol".
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Horace Campbell and Maximilian Forte have written two solid accounts describing the reality versus myths of regime change in Libya. Clintons characterization of accelerating the fall of Qaddafi is a cynical understatement, like her self congratulatory comment that we came, we saw, he died after rebels killed Qaddafi on the street. Many of the refugees drowning in the Mediterannean Sea or reaching the shores of Italy today are a direct consequence of that operation. Yet who has been held to account?
Full article: http://dissidentvoice.org/2015/09/the-wicked-war-on-syria/
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Britain, Libya and the Mediterranean - The Creation of a Humanitarian Emergency
by Dan Glazebrook / May 1st, 2015
NATOs war of aggression against Libya in 2011 turned the country over to racist death squads, with hundreds of sub-Saharan migrant workers and black Libyans beaten and burnt to death by the revolutionaries and tens of thousands illegally detained and tortured by the militias. Tawergha, the only black African town on the Mediterranean, and formerly home to around 30,000 people, is now a ghost town after NATOs shock troops militias with names like the Brigades for the purging of black skins ethnically cleansed the region. Last weeks butchering of 30 Ethiopian workers by ISIS is but the latest chapter in the anti-African pogroms that have characterised the Libyan insurgency from the very start. This is the reality of NATOs Libyan revolution (led by AbdulHakim BelHaj, now leader of ISIS in Libya) and it is precisely this from which black Africans in Libya are now fleeing. As Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi put it, a person has to risk his life because he needs to escape from a situation where they are chopping off the heads of those near him.
And this head-chopping has not been restricted to Libyas borders. NATOs war has boosted head-choppers across the entire region, from Tunisia and Algeria to Mali, Nigeria and Cameroon. Before 2011, Boko Haram barely existed. Today, thanks to NATO opening up Libyas arsenals to them and their friends, they are killing hundreds every week, often burning them alive in churches and mosques. As one Nigerian told a reporter last week, We prefer to die trying (to migrate) than stay back there and die .Stay at home and get shot dead or maybe burnt to death; I just prefer to die while trying or survive.
Yet the Libyan war itself is only the latest in a long series of acts of aggression launched by the British state and its allies, all of which continue to have disastrous consequences across the entire Middle East and North Africa region. A look at the list of where the migrants come from makes this devastatingly clear. The majority of the worlds refugees come from one of three countries: Afghanistan, Somalia and Syria. What all have in common is that they have all been subject to vicious terror campaigns by Britain, the USA and their allies: whether directly, as in Afghanistan; through allied states, as with the US-backed Ethiopian invasion of Somalia in 2006 (which toppled the first stable government the country had had in decades); or through the provision of cash, weapons and diplomatic cover to sectarian death squads, as in the case of Syria. Yemen is the latest additional source of refugees, with the Saudi bombing campaign bringing new arrivals to almost 10,000 per week.
Full article: http://dissidentvoice.org/2015/05/britain-libya-and-the-mediterranean/
Behind Every Refugee Stands an Arms Trader
http://dissidentvoice.org/2015/04/behind-every-refugee-stands-an-arms-trader/
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Trapped in Libya: the flotsam of the Wests wars
By Vijay Prashad
Source: al-Araby
May 14, 2015
European ambassadors have drafted a UN resolution, under chapter VII (which allows use of force), to tackle the crisis. For them the military option is the brightest light. As Mogherini said, the EU wants the authority to use all necessary means to seize and dispose of the [smugglers] vessels.
Thus far in 2015, over 60,000 people have tried to cross from Libya to Europe. Of them, close to two thousand have died a death toll 20 times higher than in 2014, it continues.
The threat to the refugees is a direct outcome of UN Security Council Resolution 1973, ironically under the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) banner. A new UNSC resolution is not going to be about the protection of the refugees, but to use force to destroy their lifeline. R2P has been ground under by the Wests behavior in Libya.
Full article: https://zcomm.org/znetarticle/trapped-in-libya-the-flotsam-of-the-wests-wars/
On Monday, a New York Times story demonstrated more specifically why Clinton's interactions with Blumenthal may have been a bad idea. Blumenthal, the Times reports via solid sources, was advising the Secretary of State both before and after former Libyan autocrat Muammar Qaddafi's death while also advising a group of private individuals who hoped to make money by obtaining reconstruction-type contracts in a post-Qaddafi Libya.
Much of the Libya intelligence that Mr. Blumenthal passed on to Mrs. Clinton appears to have come from a group of business associates he was advising as they sought to win contracts from the Libyan transitional government. The venture, which was ultimately unsuccessful, involved other Clinton friends, a private military contractor and one former C.I.A. spy seeking to get in on the ground floor of the new Libyan economy ...
http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2015/05/18/hillary_clinton_sidney_blumenthal_libya_unofficial_adviser_represented_business.html
The detritus of regime change in Libya
By Vijay Prashad
Source: al-Araby
November 1, 2015
Much the same story is being repeated with the emergence of IS in Libya. Adversaries of Gaddafi in the 1990s took refuge in the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group; one of whose strongholds was the town of Derna.
These fighters fled the country to join the Jihad International in Afghanistan, Chechnya, Iraq, Yemen and Syria.
It had become a familiar matter to meet an al-Libi in the redoubts of the jihadis. Studies show that Libya provided per capita the highest number of jihadis to this global campaign.
Full article: https://zcomm.org/znetarticle/the-detritus-of-regime-change-in-libya/
Deadliest Terror in the World: The Wests Latest Gift to Africa
by Dan Glazebrook / November 30th, 2015
The earliest casualty of NATOs war outside Libya was Mali. Taureg fighters who had worked in Gaddafis security forces fled Libya soon after Gaddafis government was overthrown, and mounted an insurgency in Northern Mali. They, in turn, were overthrown, however, by Al Qaedas regional affiliates flush with Libyan weaponry who then turned Northern Mali into another base from which to train and launch attacks. Boko Haram was a key beneficiary. As Brendan O Neill wrote in an excellent 2014 article worth quoting at length:
Boko Haram benefited enormously from the vacuum created in once-peaceful northern Mali following the Wests ousting of Gaddafi. In two ways: first, it honed its guerrilla skills by fighting alongside more practised Islamists in Mali, such as AQIM; and second, it accumulated some of the estimated 15,000 pieces of Libyan military hardware and weaponry that leaked across the countrys borders following the sweeping aside of Gaddafi. In April 2012, Agence France France Presse reported that dozens of Boko Haram fighters were assisting AQIM and others in northern Mali. This had a devastating knock-on effect in Nigeria. As the Washington Post reported in early 2013, The Islamist insurgency in northern Nigeria has entered a more violent phase as militants return to the fight with sophisticated weaponry and tactics learned on the battlefields of nearby Mali. A Nigerian analyst said Boko Harams level of audacity was high [in late 2012], immediately following the movement of some of its militants to the Mali region.
Full article: http://dissidentvoice.org/2015/11/deadliest-terror-in-the-world-the-wests-latest-gift-to-africa/
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/05/the-problem-with-hillarys-friends/393635/
The memos covered everything from warnings about possible terrorist attacks and the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood within Libya to the potential training of Libyan rebels and the hiring of new economic advisers by the Libyan premier. As the National Journal reports, the House Benghazi Committee is already seeking Blumenthals testimony.
WE CAME, WE SAW, HE DIED 10.20.15 6:00 PM ET
Hillarys Libya Post-War Plan Was Play It by Ear, Gates Says
She still defends the invasion as smart power at its best. But war backers like Clinton had no plan for securing the country, says ex-Pentagon chief Bob Gates.
As secretary of state, it was Clintons job to ask questions about the state of Libya, both before the intervention and after. She was secretary when the intervention beganand when the U.S. presence in Benghazi ended with a deadly attack. And while she held talks in the early months after Gaddafis death, Libya became largely a public afterthought. In the email caches released so far from her personal account, former adviser Sidney Blumenthal repeatedly kept Libya before Clinton, sharing his views of the situation, at the time contradicting the diplomats working for Clinton. Blumenthal, a longtime adviser to both Clinton and President Clinton, was not an expert on the region.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/10/20/hillary-s-libya-post-war-plan-was-play-it-by-ear-gates-says.html
Hillary's record as Secretary of State is among the most militaristic, and disastrous, of modern US history. Some experience. Hilary was a staunch defender of the military-industrial-intelligence complex at every turn, helping to spread the Iraq mayhem over a swath of violence that now stretches from Mali to Afghanistan. Two disasters loom largest: Libya and Syria.
Hillary has been much attacked for the deaths of US diplomats in Benghazi, but her tireless promotion of the overthrow Muammar Qaddafi by NATO bombing is the far graver disaster. Hillary strongly promoted NATO-led regime change in Libya, not only in violation of international law but counter to the most basic good judgment. After the NATO bombing, Libya descended into civil war while the paramilitaries and unsecured arms stashes in Libya quickly spread west across the African Sahel and east to Syria. The Libyan disaster has spawned war in Mali, fed weapons to Boko Haram in Nigeria, and fueled ISIS in Syria and Iraq. In the meantime, Hillary found it hilarious to declare of Qaddafi: "We came, we saw, he died."
Perhaps the crowning disaster of this long list of disasters has been Hillary's relentless promotion of CIA-led regime change in Syria. Once again Hillary bought into the CIA propaganda that regime change to remove Bashir al-Assad would be quick, costless, and surely successful. In August 2011, Hillary led the US into disaster with her declaration Assad must "get out of the way," backed by secret CIA operations.
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/02/05/hillary-candidate-war-machine
Just as much a sham as Iraq, with the exact same results. And on ........ to Syria.
Cheese Sandwich (8,079 posts)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511413353#post13
Dem2
(8,168 posts)When you have to go to your little island site and do a data dump, you know you've lost the argument.
polly7
(20,582 posts)What island site are you talking about? DU2? That's where I started collecting this. The rest - here. Have you got a problem with DU2 and this site??
Dem2
(8,168 posts)My opinion differs from yours --- get used to people seeing the world differently. Gritting your teeth and dumping your "facts" won't change my opinion as I've been living this reality for the past 40 years. Qaddafi was a piece of human excrement and now he's gone. Good fucking riddance.
polly7
(20,582 posts)in the rest of Africa. TOO good of things, all explained in my previous post. We ALL know exactly what happens when any country in the world not yet under the thumb of the west gets too uppity - it wouldn't have mattered if it were fucking Mother Theresa leading Libya.
Pathetic.
JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)It doesn't mean the Iraqi people wanted a U.S. invasion, any more than the Libyan people did.
Dem2
(8,168 posts)Don't change the subject.
JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)Your "shed a tear for a dictator" is changing the subject from the utter carnage that has been created in Libya as a result of the U.S. military intervention and destruction of that nation.
PS - Glad you're expanding your vocabulary through the repeated use of the word "fallacy," even if you could now work on the actual meaning of it rather than mere usage.
Dem2
(8,168 posts)You just keep on tossing "curveballs" at me and attempting to project your Iraq obsession onto me.
JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)Overseen by Clinton.
Exactly like Bush defenders use "Saddam" as a distraction from other U.S. war crimes (that Clinton voted for).
cali
(114,904 posts)onecaliberal
(32,861 posts)NorthCarolina
(11,197 posts)BootinUp
(47,151 posts)Last edited Wed May 25, 2016, 11:15 PM - Edit history (2)
You realize that an indictment on confidential document handling is known to require intentionally leaking, releasing it, or gross negligence?
Maybe you don't think that is the case? Maybe you think she did do that intentionally?
From your OP all I can tell is you chalk everything you don't like about government to the grand conspiracy. You will never be too happy with with it then.
Fawke Em
(11,366 posts)You do NOT have to intentionally leak the information to be charged with a crime.
You don't have to believe me, but you might want to believe former CIA Agent John Kiriakou who served 30 months in prison for unintentionally leaking classified info (the name of another CIA agent) to a reporter.
https://fas.org/irp/congress/2014_cr/kiriakou.html
BootinUp
(47,151 posts)JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)I'm sure you have a list.
panader0
(25,816 posts)BootinUp
(47,151 posts)COLGATE4
(14,732 posts)merrily
(45,251 posts)CT
BootinUp
(47,151 posts)merrily
(45,251 posts)BootinUp
(47,151 posts)trying to understand it.
merrily
(45,251 posts)spin
(17,493 posts)In a well functioning representative democracy or a constitutional republic it is far more critical.
When those at the highest levels of our government can get away with any damn thing they please we start sliding into a becoming a banana republic.
FSogol
(45,485 posts)Fawke Em
(11,366 posts)That email server had national defense secrets on it that weren't protected from our enemies, so, yeah, it is as bad.
JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)I'm sure you have a list.
merrily
(45,251 posts)JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)And you guys stamping your feet doesn't meet that standard.
merrily
(45,251 posts)I wasn't stamping my feet, just pointing out that your prior post was wrong (too). Apparently, that caused you to fling silly accusations, but it didn't need to. That was your choice.
JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)Please list them.
Lacking that, you have nothing.
merrily
(45,251 posts)stamping comment.
merrily
(45,251 posts)JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)the private e-mail server was used in the commission of war crimes, though these are of the kind that are considered routine and acceptable in American foreign policy. And of course of no concern to the FBI or any other official investigators of the server question. But should be to us.
Response to Bread and Circus (Original post)
Corruption Inc This message was self-deleted by its author.
andym
(5,443 posts)Zen Democrat
(5,901 posts)merrily
(45,251 posts)There is prosecutorial discretion, but selection is supposed to be based on things like strength of the evidence.
wisteria
(19,581 posts)merrily
(45,251 posts)JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)Wait, there was no "malice" "intended." Just friendly, well-targeted bombs, the dead are militants. And torture centers had passes from lawyers and psychiatrists, who were just giving professional advice. Hooray!
(Above is assuming you mean Petraeus. The bombs part at least fits Clinton too, or any U.S. admin so far.)
JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)Besides which, what was this war criminal charged with? Having a fucking insecure e-mail account he shared with his paramour?
JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)peace13
(11,076 posts)Martha Stewart. There is a chance that they will have to keep the woman in line. In which case Hill will be charged. Time will tell.
merrily
(45,251 posts)Every now and again, they will make an example of someone rich and well-known--especially if they are not members of the party in power. She is a Democrat, arrested in 2004 for trading stock on tip. Meanwhile Madoff was free then and for another four years.
She had big bucks, but I don't know how much political power she was wielding.
wisteria
(19,581 posts)At the most her email problems will amount to misunderstanding, and over protective of her privacy.
merrily
(45,251 posts)Last edited Thu May 26, 2016, 12:05 AM - Edit history (1)
Or it shouldn't. She made the decision to intermingle government business and personal business. They should have been separate. IMO, she did that exactly so she would have an excuse. She knew what she was doing was wrong.
COLGATE4
(14,732 posts)merrily
(45,251 posts)Maedhros
(10,007 posts)but as a security professional I hold an entirely different opinion, and your empty assertions mean nothing.
RobertEarl
(13,685 posts)DWS has helped them gain power and they can indict whoever they choose. They choose Hillary.
Look what they did to her husband.
Response to Bread and Circus (Original post)
artislife This message was self-deleted by its author.
NorthCarolina
(11,197 posts)JackRiddler
(24,979 posts)Next you'll suggest that Soviet jokes weren't on a solid empirical grounding by academic method?
Jack Bone
(2,023 posts)because I don't think Bernie will when he gets in.