Clipmarks |

Rumsfeld forbade post-war planning

Sat, 09 Sep 2006 17:17:13 GMT

clipped by: tpq62

Army Brig. Gen. Mark Scheid, an early planner of the war, tells about challenges of invasion and rebuilding.

FORT EUSTIS -- Months before the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld forbade military strategists from developing plans for securing a post-war Iraq, the retiring commander of the Army Transportation Corps said Thursday.

In fact, said Brig. Gen. Mark Scheid, Rumsfeld said "he would fire the next person" who talked about the need for a post-war plan.

Rumsfeld did replace Gen. Eric Shinseki, the Army chief of staff in 2003, after Shinseki told Congress that hundreds of thousands of troops would be needed to secure post-war Iraq.

Tags: iraq

Pentagon suppressing Baghdad death toll

Sat, 09 Sep 2006 20:26:05 GMT

clipped by: jklugman

Clip Source: www.realcities.com

Posted on Fri, Sep. 08, 2006

U.S. count of Baghdad deaths excludes car bombs, mortar attacks

By Mark Brunswick and Zaineb Obeid

McClatchy Newspapers

BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. officials, seeking a way to measure the results of a program aimed at decreasing violence in Baghdad, aren't counting scores of dead killed in car bombings and mortar attacks as victims of the country's sectarian violence.

In a distinction previously undisclosed, U.S. military spokesman Lt. Col. Barry Johnson said Friday that the United States is including in its tabulations of sectarian violence only deaths of individuals killed in drive-by shootings or by torture and execution.

That has allowed U.S. officials to boast that the number of deaths from sectarian violence in Baghdad declined by more than 52 percent in August over July.

But it eliminates from tabulation huge numbers of people whose deaths are certainly part of the ongoing conflict between Sunni and Shiite Muslims. Not included, for example, are scores of people who died in a highly coordinated bombing that leveled an entire apartment building in eastern Baghdad, a stronghold of rebel Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Tags: military, bush administration, deception, iraq, civil war, civilian-killings, fubar

Writer of ABC’s 9/11 ‘Docudrama’ Is Avowed Conservative Activist

Fri, 01 Sep 2006 21:31:58 GMT

clipped by: arifsali
clipper's remarks: Title says it all. Now why would ABC invest in creating a biased version of the events?

Clip Source: thinkprogress.org

Writer of ABC’s 9/11 ‘Docudrama’ Is Avowed Conservative Activist

The writer of the movie is an unabashed conservative named Cyrus Nowrasteh. Last year, Nowrasteh spoke on a panel titled, “Rebels With a Cause: How Conservatives Can Lead Hollywood’s Next Paradigm Shift.” He has described Michael Moore as “an out of control socialist weasel,” and conducted interviews with right-wing websites like FrontPageMag.

Tags: tv, 9/11, republicans, democrats, conservatives