The following links (from today’s NYT) are dangerously unstable and might EXPIRE AT ANY MINUTE! Read them NOW!!!

• The 15,000 square-foot garden of swanky One Sutton Place has actually been owned by the City of New York for the last thirteen years. The residents had a secret non-disclosure pact so the City wouldn't find out.
• Taki al-Moosawi was imprisoned in a dungeon for several months by Saddam's regime, and his nephew Mehdi was executed with hand grenades. Still, Dr. Moosawi says, "it is freedom the Americans have given us, but it is not good freedom."
• Yeah, of course Pete Rose gambled on baseball, and of course he bet on the Reds. The real thing is: did he ever bet against the Reds?

originally posted by daiichi

It was Rumsfeld and Shultz who told Hussein and his emissaries that U.S. statements generally condemning the use of chemical weapons would not interfere with relations between secular Iraq and the Reagan administration, which took Iraq off the terrorist-nations list and embraced Hussein as a bulwark against fundamentalist Iran. Ironically, the U.S supported Iraq when it possessed and used weapons of mass destruction and invaded it when it didn't.

originally posted by xowie

“This compilation of soldiers words, as published in the Christian Science Monitor, Evening Star, Los Angeles Times and several other publications, provides another side of the story of Occupied Iraq.”

John Dean thinks Bush makes Nixon look good. Is lying about the reason for a war an impeachable offense?

originally posted by xowie

The Day Of The Jackals, a speech by Arundhati Roy.

originally posted by xowie

Full text of Arundhati Roy’s recent speech, Instant-Mix Imperial Democracy (Buy One, Get One Free).

originally posted by xowie

Dammit, why does that Iraq civilian casualty count keep going up?

Uh… There’s a little thing in the news today about MP George Galloway.

originally posted by xowie

Amid the ashes of Iraqi history, I found a file blowing in the wind outside: pages of handwritten letters between the court of Sharif Hussein of Mecca, who started the Arab revolt against the Turks for Lawrence of Arabia, and the Ottoman rulers of Baghdad. And the Americans did nothing. All over the filthy yard they blew, letters of recommendation to the courts of Arabia, demands for ammunition for troops, reports on the theft of camels and attacks on pilgrims, all in delicate hand-written Arabic script. I was holding in my hands the last Baghdad vestiges of Iraq's written history.

originally posted by xowie

In my fourth-grade geography class under a superb teacher, Miss Wagner, I was first introduced to the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, the palm trees and dates, the kayaks plying the rivers, camel caravans and desert oases, the Arabian Nights, Aladdin and His Wonderful Lamp (my first movie), the ancient city of Baghdad, Mesopotamia, the Fertile Crescent. This was the first class in elementary school that fired my imagination. Those wondrous images have stayed with me for more than seventy years. And it now troubles me to hear of America's bombs, missiles and military machines ravishing the cradle of civilization.

originally posted by xowie

"I am an American," he says after a minute. "I stand with the pope and former President Jimmy Carter. In this country, you say what you think."

originally posted by xowie

"One group of Iraqi boys on the side of the road smiled and waved as a convoy of British tanks and trucks rolled by. But once it had passed, leaving a trail of dust and grit in its wake, their smiles turned to scowls. 'We don't want them here,' said 17-year-old Fouad, looking angrily up at the plumes of grey smoke rising from Basra. 'Saddam is our leader,' he said defiantly. 'Saddam is good'."

originally posted by xowie

Washington Post: Two B-1 Bombers Employed In Iraq (Saturday, March 15th).

Now, with more than 1,200 warplanes in the region, the Air Force and Navy have intensified the patrols, and one recent day flew 1,000 sorties -- that is, one mission by one plane -- into Iraqi airspace. Some military experts contend that the U.S. military effectively is engaged in combat operations that are staying just below the threshold of war, but are preparing the way for an eventual air and ground assault.

At his news conference last week, George W. Bush broke a 43-year tradition by failing to call on Helen Thomas, now of the Hearst Syndicate, who has been asking questions at presidential news conferences since 1960. Thomas is openly critical of this administration, and particularly of this war. Afraid to take a question from an 82-year-old woman? Bush has no class. Equally disgusting was the White house press corps' failure to respond to the insult. What makes that bunch of smug chumps think it won't be done to any one of them?

originally posted by xowie

They are counting on the combination of battlefield omniscience, smart bombs and new weapons like microwave pulses and nausea gases to drive Baghdadis out of their homes and bunkers. The use of "nonlethal" (sic) weapons against civilian populations, especially in light of the horror of what happened during the Moscow hostage crisis last October, is a war crime waiting to happen.

originally posted by xowie