Osama's back and stumping for Kerry

Vote for Kerry or die. Or something

Excerpt:

It is important to notice what he has stopped saying in this speech.
He has stopped talking about the restoration of the Global Caliphate.
There is no more mention of the return of Andalusia. There is no more
anticipation that Islam will sweep the world. He is no longer boasting
that Americans run at the slightest wounds; that they are more cowardly
than the Russians. He is not talking about future operations to swathe
the world in fire but dwelling on past glories. He is basically saying
if you leave us alone we will leave you alone. Though it is couched in
his customary orbicular phraseology he is basically asking for time out.

The American answer to Osama's proposal will be given on Election Day.
One response is to agree that the United States of America will
henceforth act like Sweden, which is on track to become majority Islamic
sometime after the middle of this century. The electorate best knows
which candidate will serve this end; which candidate most promises to be
European-like in attitude and they can choose that path with both eyes
open. The electorate can strike that bargain and Osama may keep his
word. The other course is to reject Osama's terms utterly; to recognize
the pleading in his outwardly belligerent manner and reply that his
fugitive existence; the loss of his sanctuaries; the annihilation of his
men are but the merest foretaste of what is yet to come: to say that to
enemies such as he, the initials 'US' will always mean Unconditional
Surrender.

Osama has stated his terms. He awaits America's answer.

I say:

Osama's been out of action for a few years, probably recuperating
from injuries in the more lawless parts of Pakistan. But he's back, and
he's telling us how to vote. Maybe he thinks we're Spaniards or something.

Wretchard has him pegged. He's evil but not stupid. If he thought he
were winning, he wouldn't bother trying to influence the election. He'd
just attack us. In fact. he'd have attacked us several times by now.
He knows our weakness, and that weakness is John F. Kerry, Lickspittle
of Massachusetts. The only question is will a majority of voters be
dumb enough to fall for such a clumsy attempt at arm twisting?

(Walter Cronkite thinks this latest Osama video is a Karl Rove scam.
Well, maybe he was kidding.)

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100,000 Iraqis dead!

Well, maybe not

Excerpt:

The report's authors derive this figure by estimating how many
Iraqis died in a 14-month period before the U.S. invasion, conducting
surveys on how many died in a similar period after the invasion began
(more on those surveys later), and subtracting the difference. That
difference - the number of "extra" deaths in the post-invasion period -
signifies the war's toll. That number is 98,000. But read the passage
that cites the calculation more fully:

We estimate there were 98,000 extra deaths (95% CI 8000-194 000) during
the post-war period.

Readers who are accustomed to perusing statistical documents know what
the set of numbers in the parentheses means. For the other 99.9 percent
of you, I'll spell it out in plain English - which, disturbingly, the
study never does. It means that the authors are 95 percent confident
that the war-caused deaths totaled some number between 8,000 and
194,000. (The number cited in plain language - 98,000 - is roughly at
the halfway point in this absurdly vast range.)

This isn't an estimate. It's a dart board.

I say:

The Lancet admits the article was rushed to print. Why?

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The incredible shrinking explosives looting scandal

More and more like the museum looting

Excerpt:

Iraqi officials may be overstating the amount of explosives reported
to have disappeared from a weapons depot, documents obtained by ABC News
show.

The Iraqi interim government has told the United States and international
weapons inspectors that 377 tons of conventional explosives are missing
from the Al-Qaqaa installation, which was supposed to be under U.S
military control.

But International Atomic Energy Agency documents obtained by ABC News and
first reported on "World News Tonight with Peter Jennings" indicate the
amount of missing explosives may be substantially less than the Iraqis
reported.

The information on which the Iraqi Science Ministry based an Oct. 10
memo in which it reported that 377 tons of RDX explosives were missing -
presumably stolen due to a lack of security - was based on "declaration"
from July 15, 2002. At that time, the Iraqis said there were 141 tons of
RDX explosives at the facility.

But the confidential IAEA documents obtained by ABC News show that on
Jan. 14, 2003, the agency's inspectors recorded that just over three
tons of RDX were stored at the facility - a considerable discrepancy
from what the Iraqis reported.

The IAEA documents could mean that 138 tons of explosives were removed
from the facility long before the United States launched "Operation
Iraqi Freedom" in March 2003.

I say:

It's looking more and more like whatever went missing did so while
we were wasting precious time with the UN Security Council. And rumor
is it all went to Syria, with help from Russian Special Forces.

Also, it's said that CBS planned to come out with this just before the
election for maximum impact, leaving no time to debunk, but the New York
Times jumped the gun.

One thing we know for sure: this scandal is trumped up, just like most
of the others.

Oh, and speaking of weapons caches:

Excerpt:

Littered with burned out Soviet military vehicles, the whole area is
a junk pile strewn with every sort of live ammunition, fuses, unexploded
shells, rockets, etc., all supposedly under the authority of Belgian
troops (at the moment), who ignored it.

In the midst of examining the bunkers and taking photos, a Swedish UN
guy, a French major and a German colonel arrived to make a fuss and
order the Canadians to leave. The French major insisted his government
had a deal with the Afghan government for the area, and ISAF had no
business being there.

This cut little ice with Maj. Hynes, who is responsible -- not to the
commander of Camp Julien, Col. Jim Ellis -- but to the ANA, which has
now moved in to secure the site.

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About those missing explosives at al Qaqqaa

Seems they were missing to begin with

Excerpts:

Now, the story fails to answer one core question: when did these
explosives go missing? It is simply never mentioned anywhere in the body
of the story. American forces, one official is quoted as saying, went
through the facility sometime towards the beginning of the war, saw no
materials carrying the IAEA seal, and moved on. Buried deep within the
story is the most likely explanation for what happened to the stockpile:
it was standard Iraqi practice to, prior to bombing, move explosives out
into the open and camouflage it. In all probability, it was long gone
before any American soldiers ever got near the place...

First: in all probability most of what was at Al Qaqaa and these other
places was looted before the arrival of US troops. Post-war intelligence
confirms what many of us have long believed: that Saddam had, by March
of 2003, abandoned all hope of defeating the United States in a
conventional war and, therefore, had staked his hopes on the victory of
a guerrilla force which, in collaboration with seditionists in America,
would undermine the morale of the American people and force a US
withdrawal.

I say:

This is another overhyped story, very similar to the trumped up
museum looting scandal. The only thing making it different is it comes
very close to the election, leaving very little time to get the
debunking out there.

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Saddam-terror links, with documents and photos

They exist whether you say they do or not

Excerpts:

Let's start with money. At a minimum, we know that Saddam Hussein's
government supported terrorism by paying "bonuses" of up to $25,000 to
the families of Palestinian homicide bombers. How do we know this?
Tariq Aziz, Hussein's own deputy prime minister, was stunningly candid
about the Baathist government's underwriting of terrorist killings in
Israel...

Between the time Saddam Hussein boosted his bonus payments to the
families of Palestinian terrorists and the March 20, 2003 launch of
Operation Iraqi Freedom, 28 homicide bombers injured 1,209 people and
killed 223 more, including at least eight Americans. These bonus checks
were handed out at ceremonies where banners proclaimed the friendship of
the PLO's Yasser Arafat and Saddam Hussein...

The hijackers surrendered to Egyptian authorities in exchange for safe
passage to Tunisia. Abu Abbas then joined them on a flight to freedom
aboard an Egypt Air jet. However, four U.S. fighter planes forced the
airliner to land at a NATO base in Sicily. Italian officials took the
hijackers into custody. But Abbas possessed the ultimate get-out-of-jail
card: An Iraqi diplomatic passport...

After escaping Italian police in October 1985 following the Achille
Lauro hijacking (thanks to his Iraqi diplomatic passport), Abu Abbas
finally ended up in Baghdad in 1994, where he lived comfortably as one
of Saddam Hussein's guests. U.S. soldiers caught Abbas in Iraq in April
2003. This time, he did not get away. He died last March 9, in American
custody, reportedly of natural causes.

Abbas' Baghdad sojourn was not an isolated incident. Saddam Hussein
granted avowed international terrorists refuge in Baathist Iraq. Terror
mastermind Abu Nidal also enjoyed his hospitality.

So far, we have documented that Saddam Hussein harbored terrorists
(many with al-Qaeda links) responsible for international mayhem and even
the incidental deaths of Americans. But is there any evidence that Iraq
sheltered those responsible for attacks on America?

Enter Abdul Rahman Yasin...

Former ABC News correspondent Sheila MacVicar looked for Yasin, and here
is what she reported on July 27, 1994: 'Last week, [television program]
Day One confirmed [Yasin] is in Baghdad... Just a few days ago, he was
seen at [his father's] house by ABC News. Neighbors told us Yasin comes
and goes freely.'

...This is Abu Musab al Zarqawi. After running an al-Qaeda training
camp in Afghanistan, he found his way to Baathist Baghdad, where he
reportedly checked into Olympic Hospital, an elite facility run by the
late Uday Hussein, son of the captured tyrant. Zarqawi is believed to
have received medical treatment for a leg injury sustained while dodging
American GIs who toppled the Taliban. He convalesced in Baghdad for
some two months. Once he was back on his foot, Zarqawi then opened an
Ansar al-Islam terrorist training camp in northern Iraq...

The Associated Press reports that Coalition forces shut down at least
three terrorist training camps in Iraq. The most notorious of these was
the base at Salman Pak, about 15 miles southeast of Baghdad. Before the
war, numerous Iraqi defectors said the camp featured a passenger jet on
which terrorists sharpened their air piracy skills. This satellite photo
shows an urban assault training site, a three-car train for
railway-attack instruction, and a commercial airliner sitting all by
itself in the middle of the desert...

Then there is the interesting case of Ahmad Hikmat Shakir - an Iraqi VIP
facilitator who worked at the international airport in Kuala Lumpur,
Malaysia. Citing "a foreign government service," page 340 of the Senate
Intelligence Committee's report on pre-Iraq-War intelligence indicates
that, "Shakir claimed he got this job through Ra'ad al-Mudaris, an Iraqi
Embassy employee" in Malaysia. On January 5, 2000, Shakir greeted Khalid
al Midhar and Nawaz al Hamzi at Kuala Lampur?s airport. He then escorted
them to a local hotel where these September 11 hijackers met with 9/11
conspirators Ramzi bin al Shibh and Tawfiz al Atash. Five days later,
according to The Weekly Standard's Stephen Hayes, Shakir disappeared...

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CNS: Saddam had absoulutley *no* WMD program

Well, maybe a tiny little WMD program

Excerpts:

A senior government official who is not a political appointee
provided CNSNews.com with copies of the 42 pages of Iraqi Intelligence
Service documents. The originals, some of which were hand-written and
others typed, are in Arabic. CNSNews.com had the papers translated into
English by two individuals separately and independent of each other.

There are no hand-writing samples to which the documents can be
compared for forensic analysis and authentication. However, three other
experts - a former weapons inspector with the United Nations Special
Commission (UNSCOM), a retired CIA counter-terrorism official with vast
experience dealing with Iraq, and a former advisor to then-presidential
candidate Bill Clinton on Iraq - were asked to analyze the documents.
All said they comport with the format, style and content of other Iraqi
documents from that era known to be genuine...

They detail the Iraqi regime's purchase of five kilograms of mustard
gas on Aug. 21, 2000 and three vials of malignant pustule, another term
for anthrax, on Sept. 6, 2000. The purchase order for the mustard gas
includes gas masks, filters and rubber gloves. The order for the anthrax
includes sterilization and decontamination equipment.

The documents show that Iraqi intelligence received the mustard gas and
anthrax from "Saddam's company," which Tefft said was probably a
reference to Saddam General Establishment, "a complex of factories
involved with, amongst other things, precision optics, missile, and
artillery fabrication."

"Sa'ad's general company" is listed on the Iraqi documents as the
supplier of the sterilization and decontamination equipment that
accompanied the anthrax vials. Tefft believes this is a reference to the
Salah Al-Din State Establishment, also involved in missile construction.

The Jaber Ibn Hayan General Company is listed as the supplier of the
safety equipment that accompanied the mustard gas order. Tefft described
the company as "a 'turn-key' project built by Romania, designed to
produce protective CW (conventional warfare) and BW (biological warfare)
equipment (gas masks and protective clothing)."

"Iraq had an ongoing biological warfare project continuing through the
period when the UNSCOM inspections ended," the senior government
official and source of the documents said. "This should cause us to
redouble our efforts to find the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction
programs."

I say:

First the Duelfer report, now this. Real? Time will tell.

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First ever democratic elections in Afghanistan

Remnants of Taliban sucking it up

Excerpts:

The Taliban vowed to turn the Afghan election into a day of
bloodshed, but the rebels mounted only a smattering of small-scale
attacks on police and civilians and a larger clash that left many of
their own dead.

After months of what proved to be empty threats, military commanders
and ordinary Afghans said Sunday the vote was a serious setback for the
holdouts of the hard-line Islamic regime that was driven from power by
U.S. bombs almost three years ago for harboring Osama bin Laden...

At least a dozen election workers and dozens of Afghan security officers
were killed in the run-up to the election, which Taliban militants had
threatened to disrupt as part of their campaign to drive out foreign
troops and topple U.S.-backed interim leader Hamid Karzai.

The violence curtailed voter registration in the south and east of the
country, a conservative land where the Taliban continues to derive
support. But officials said voting had to be abandoned in only one
southern district because of violence the notorious Daychopan area of
Zabul province where militants clashed with Afghan troops.

Afghan officials said 100,000 police and troops including about 27,000
foreign soldiers, most of them Americans were involved in the operation
to secure the election. Some fought with militants in Uruzgan province,
prompting U.S. airstrikes that Gov. Jan Mohammed Khan said killed 25
militants and one civilian.

I say:

Between this and some controversy over ink, it was hardly a picture
perfect election. But it wasn't half bad for a first time ever.
Practise makes perfect. Anyway, the monitors are happy. And even
the United Nations monitors aren't showing much sympathy to the
candidates calling the elections unfair.

Even the BBC says it was good.

Excerpt:

The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) said
demands by 15 of the 18 presidential candidates to annul the poll were
"unjustified".

The local Free and Fair Elections Foundation of Afghanistan (FEFA) said
the poll was "fairly democratic".

We have to wait until the ballots are counted to know who won. But
we already know who lost - the Taliban and other haters of democracy.
They did their worst, and the election happened regardless. I dare say
they've shot their wad.

Next up, Iraq in January.

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Meanwhile in Australia

John Howard wins re-election

Excerpt:

Prime Minister John Howard won an historic fourth term tonight after
Labor's vote collapsed in Tasmania and the ALP failed to make ground in
key marginal seats.

The result could leave the ALP in a worse position than after the 2001
election, with predictions Mr Howard could increase his majority.

I say:

Howard is the first leader to face a vote of those who intervened
against Saddam. His opponent was for bringing the troops home.

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Coalition of the billing

Confirmed: Saddam 'bought UN allies' with oil

Excerpt:

The UN oil-for-food scheme was set up in 1995 to allow Iraq to sell
controlled amounts of oil to raise money for humanitarian supplies.
However, the leaked report reveals Saddam systematically abused the
scheme, using it to buy 'political influence' throughout the world.

The former Iraqi regime was in effect free to 'allocate' oil to whom it
wished. Dozens of private individuals were given oil at knockdown
prices. They were able to nominate recognised traders to buy the cheap
oil from the Iraqi state oil firm and sell it for a personal profit.

The report says oil was given to key countries: 'The regime gave
priority to Russia, China and France. This was because they were
permanent members of, and hence had the ability to influence decisions
made by, the UN Security Council. The regime . . . allocated 'private
oil' to individuals or political parties that sympathised in some way
with the regime.

The report also details how the regime benefited by arranging illegal
'kickbacks' from oil sales.

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Meanwhile in Iran

Jonah Goldberg directs our attention

Excerpt:

Tehran, the nation's capital, as well as several other cities have
been wracked in recent days with widespread anti-government protests
and violent crackdowns by government forces. Buildings have been set
ablaze, and exiles are calling for revolution. According to reports on
Activistchat.com, a Web site dedicated to freeing Iran from the
oppressive rule of the mullahs, numerous protestors have been killed.
Ledeen - who has many sources inside Iran and out - reports that the
roundups and executions of young men have picked up at a terrific pace.
Iran has staged 120 public hangings since March alone, according to the
government's own news agency.

The unpopularity of the mullahs, primarily with the younger,
Western-oriented generation, is causing panic inside the regime. The
appeal of revolutionary theocracy has been bled dry. The Christian
Science Monitor reported - some would say "reluctantly reported" - that
discontent with the regime and a desire for "change" according to
various "polls" equals 90 percent. And we all remember those famous
soccer games where Iranian fans chanted "USA! USA!"

I say:

A democratic revolution in Iran would make our concerns about Iran
getting nukes irrelevant. Unless you're one of the moral equivalence
crowd who think democracies can no more be trusted with nuclear weapons
that can insane dictators.

Oh, and democracy is a good thing in and of itself. At least *I* think
so. Don't you agree?

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The global test!

How to get permission to defend democracy

Excerpt:
First of all, what is the objective of your desired act of imperialist aggression?
Unlawfully seize oil fields (0 points)

Install US puppet government (0 points)

Disarm megalomaniacal dictator with WMD (will need to submit
authenticated proof--CIA or MI6 documents will not be acceptable) (100
points)

Encourage spread of democracy in region (-200 points)

Put down violent rebellion in former colony (10000 points)

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