corrente

Speculation runs rampant that Kerry set up that "reduce terrorism to something you treat as a nuisance" line in Sunday's NYT Magazine article as a tar baby for Dubya. Hit that tar baby, Georgie. It's a nice soft target. Hit it with your left hand. Then hit it with your right. Now kick it with your left foot....

(via Juan Cole)

The scenario of Cheney, whereby "terrorist groups" get nuclear weapons, is at the moment ridiculous. Terrorist groups do not have the capability to build football-arena size facilities to enrich uranium. And contrary to what Cheney keeps alleging, no government is going to give a terrorist group an atomic bomb. Governments with atomic bombs don't like to share with civilians, for fear of their own safety.

The "war on terror" of Bush-Cheney is a smokescreen for naked American imperial aggression. The sad story of how Iraq posed no threat either to the US or to any of its neighbors, despite high-decibel claims to the contrary for two years by Bush, Cheney and their acolytes, will be repeated in the case of Syria and Iran if Bush and Cheney are reelected. They hope that their project of overthrowing governments in the region will go smoothly, but they do not really care, since even an Iran and a Syria in chaos is a net gain from their point of view. Chaos creates "terror" and justifies further US involvement, aggression and control. It is inconvenient for the rest of us, but then they insist, unlike John Kerry, that we live with the nuisances they are creating.

In actual fact, al-Qaeda is just a somewhat more successful version of Baader Meinhoff. It is a small terrorist group that has been created by a particular juncture in history. It is not a reason to abolish the US Bill of Rights, as Bush, Cheney and Ashcroft are doing. It is not a reason to invade three or four countries (precisely the few countries where it does not operate!) It is a nuisance to a free society, and should be curbed.

Bush and Cheney keep shouting that Kerry doesn't understand the war on terror. They mean he doesn't want to overthrow the governments of Syria and Iran. As for themselves, if the war on terror is so important to them, why are Bin Laden and Zawahiri at large? Why can al-Qaeda still strike at will? We now have the worst of both worlds, with a quagmire in Iraq and Palestine, and more quagmires planned, while al-Qaeda morphs and grows and continues to form a threat.

When the Oklahoma City bombing took place we didn't call out the 10th Mountain Division and start bombing the crap out of rural white males. We called the police, and the FBI, and had an investigation, and arrested the bombers and put them on trial. They were...what's that saying?..."brought to justice."