Iraq War Grief Daily Witness (photo) Day 214

11 Comments

1. 

   RubDMC on January 1, 2006 at 3:16 pm

   

   Click on the candle to copy the image into your own comment (you can leave it on my server), and/or rate this one – not for mojo, but to leave a small mark after taking this moment.

   ” I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.”
   from Dirge Without Music
   by Edna St. Vincent Millay

   • 

     dada on January 1, 2006 at 3:32 pm

     

     Peace

2. 

   shermanesqe on January 1, 2006 at 3:46 pm

   

3. 

   DuctapeFatwa on January 1, 2006 at 3:54 pm

   Good soldiers follow orders and hundreds of American military men and women returned to the United States on holiday leave this month with orders to sell the Iraq war to a skeptical public.

   The program, coordinated through a Pentagon operation dubbed “Operation Homefront,” ordered military personnel to give interviews to their hometown newspapers, television stations and other media outlets and praise the American war effort in Iraq.

   Initial reports back to the Pentagon deem the operation a success with dozens of front page stories in daily and weekly newspapers around the country along with upbeat reports on local television stations.

   “We’ve learned as a military how to do this better,” Captain David Diaz, a military reservist, told his hometown paper, The Roanoke (VA) Times. “My worry is that we have the right military strategy and political strategies now but the patience of the American public is wearing thin.”

   When pressed by the paper on whether or not his commanding officers told him to talk to the press, Diaz admitted he was “encouraged” to do so.  So reporter Duncan Adams asked:

   “Did Diaz return to the U.S. on emergency leave with an agenda — to offer a positive spin that could help counter growing concerns among Americans about the U.S. exit strategy? How do we know that’s not his strategy, especially after he discloses that superior officers encouraged him to talk about his experiences in Iraq?”

   Replied Diaz:

   “You don’t. I can tell you that the direction we’ve gotten from on high is that there is a concern about public opinion out there and they want to set the record straight.”…

   “I’ve been promised an early release if I do a good job promoting the war,” says one reservist who asked not to be identified.

   In interviews with a number of reservists home for the holidays, a pattern emerges on the Pentagon’s propaganda effort. Soldiers are encouraged to contact their local news media outlets to offer interviews about the war.  A detailed set of talking points encourages them to:

   –Admit initial doubts about the war but claim conversion to a belief in the American mission;

   –Praise military leadership in Iraq and throw in a few words of support for the Bush administration;

   –Claim the mission to turn security of the country over to the Iraqis is working;

   –Reiterate that America must not abandon its mission and must stay until the “job is finished.”

   –Talk about how “things are better” now in Iraq….

   And the Army is cracking down on soldiers who go on the record opposing the war.

   Specialist Leonard Clark, a National Guardsman, was demoted to private and fined $1,640 for posting anti-war statements on an Internet blog. Clark wrote entries describing the company’s commander as a “glory seeker” and the battalion sergeant major an “inhuman monster”. His last entry before the blog was shut down told how his fellow soldiers were becoming increasingly opposed to the US operation in Iraq.

   “The message is clear,” says one reservist who is home for the holidays but has to return and asked not to be identified. “If you want to get out of this man’s Army with an honorable (discharge) and full benefits you better not tell the truth about what is happening…

   nerdified link

4. 

   ask on January 1, 2006 at 4:01 pm

   
   13 Car Bombs Wound 20 People Across Iraq

5. 

   jimstaro on January 1, 2006 at 4:19 pm

   
   Light A Candle For
   Peace, Tolerance, Understanding
   and For The Children – Innocence Lost!

   Israel: Likud members: Bomb Iran:

   About 400 Likud members, who took part Saturday evening in a conference
   organized by Agriculture Minister Yisrael Katz in the town of Hod Hasharon,
   voted by a large majority to “bomb Iran’s nuclear reactor before it is too
   late,” in the words of Likud member

   Terrorists in High Places:

   Wars are not waged by those who have to fight them. Those who fight wars know
   too well their terrible costs. Wars are waged by those who profit from them with
   minimal or no risk to themselves. War is big business and it is immensely
   profitable for a select few who are insulated from the effects of war’s
   environmental impacts and social costs.

   A Call For Help And Justice – Massacre of Tel Afar.

   We lay before the international public opinion and international human rights
   organisations the truth of what is happening in Tel Afar of the extreme use of
   force and the use of internationally forbidden weapons of poison gases, cluster,
   microwave and napalm bombs, we demand autopsies be carried out on the corpses of
   our sons who fell in the barbaric aggression by international medical bodies to
   verify the inhuman practices carried out by the American forces of occupation
   and to expose the stooge militias that participated in the massacre of Tel Afar.

   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

   Beyond “Munich”: The Ten Movies Steven Spielberg Has Yet To Make

   Imagine if we were in a parallel universe in which Hollywood gave Arabs and Muslims a fair shake. Here are ten films (all based on true stories) that are just waiting for Spielberg’s magic.

   By Mas’ood Cajee, December 8, 2005

6. 

   alohaleezy on January 1, 2006 at 4:24 pm

   IMPEACH

7. 

   Oui on January 1, 2006 at 5:35 pm

   .
   With a military boss staying the course …

   Number of deaths in 2005 equals the previous year.

   ««  click pic for story negotiating democracy in Iraq  »»
    
   Firefighters reach for the bodies of two of six men, who had been blindfolded, shot and dumped at a sewage plant. Violence continued as gunmen raided a house near Iskandariyah, 30 miles south of Baghdad, killing five members of a Sunni family, and a roadside bomb exploded in Baghdad, killing two policemen. AP Photo/Hadi Mizban

   Need action 2006 to bash some sense in the heads of voters for Midterm Election coming November. Need to refocus on the real issues and not a moving goal to suit political gains at the expense of our military in Iraq, and the lower income Americans supporting a corporate regime in Washington to advance tax cuts for the top incomes.

   Dems’ Template for Success: Follow Jack Murtha …

   

   LEAVE … Iraq to the Iraqis

   “Treason doth never prosper: what’s the reason?
   For if it prosper, none dare call it treason.”

   ▼▼▼ READ MY DIARY ▼

8. 

   BrendaStewart on January 1, 2006 at 5:57 pm

   

   What is there left to be said about this military we have and the administration that created it??!!  This is not sound and of good mind.  Their standards and ethics leave a lot to be desired.  They leave us with nothing to believe in any more.  NOTHING!!!!

   Peace………

9. 

   supersoling on January 2, 2006 at 8:23 am

   

   It’s difficult to find words to describe feelings anymore. Sometimes silent, numbing outrage speaks louder than any attempted expression.

10. 

    alohaleezy on January 2, 2006 at 10:15 am

    Does anyone know if there has been any talk of protesting in DC the day of the MisStatement of the Union? Why are we not outraged enough to get a million people pounding on the door of Congress to Impeach the Bastards?