The United States this year will have spent $100 billion on contractors in Iraq since the invasion in 2003, a milestone that reflects the Bush administration’s unprecedented level of dependence on private firms for help in the war, according to a government report to be released Tuesday.
U.S. troops still in Georgia
U.S. personnel responsible for training members of the Georgian military remain stationed inside the volatile country, where fighting erupted Friday between Russia and Georgia over the breakaway province of South Ossetia.
The U.S. European Command said on Monday that there were no plans at this time to withdraw the U.S. military trainers from the country. There are still 127 U.S. trainers in Georgia, where the American forces had been preparing the Georgian army for operations in Iraq.
TVNL Comment: So Israelis and Americans trained them. Hmmm.
US disregarded experts over biolab
The Homeland Security Department swept aside evaluations of government experts and named Mississippi — home to powerful U.S. lawmakers with sway over the agency — as a top location for a new $451 million, national laboratory to study some of the world's most virulent biological threats, according to internal documents obtained by The Associated Press.
The disclosure is the latest example of what critics assert is the Bush administration's politicizing of government decisions, such as efforts to steer science over global warming at the Environmental Protection Agency and hiring and firing practices at the Justice Department.
Some lawmakers already skeptical over the department's plans said (Homeland Security official, Undersecretary Jay) Cohen's intervention on behalf of Mississippi appears improper.
"It appears that the undersecretary responsible for this program may have corrupted the site selection process by putting his thumb on the scale in favor of a particular site and its contractor, in violation of his own rules and over the objections of his own advisers," said Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich. "This raises the question of whether DHS is interested in bioresearch or just shameless empire building."
U.S. guns arm Mexican drug cartels
More than 90% of guns seized at the border or after raids and shootings in Mexico have been traced to the United States, according to the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Last year, 2,455 weapons traces requested by Mexico showed that guns had been purchased in the United States, according to the ATF. Texas, Arizona and California accounted for 1,805 of those traced weapons.
War in Georgia: The Israeli connection
For past seven years, Israeli companies have been helping Gerogian army to preparer for war against Russia through arms deals, training of infantry units and security advice.
The fighting which broke out over the weekend between Russia and Georgia has brought Israel's intensive involvement in the region into the limelight. This involvement includes the sale of advanced weapons to Georgia and the training of the Georgian army's infantry forces.
The Defense Ministry held a special meeting Sunday to discuss the various arms deals held by Israelis in Georgia, but no change in policy has been announced as of yet.
Why TV news in the US is utter rubbish
For years it has been a joke that news in the United States is terrible: obsessed with trivia and celebrity; fronted by Botox bimbos; forever interviewing citizens about some artefact of small-town life when a major news story is breaking elsewhere.
It's not the absolute dearth of real news that is the problem, however. It's the fact that the news that is presented isn't news but mindless, misleading gossip.
So where do you get your news while living in the US? News-starved Americans usually hold up National Public Radio, NPR, as the best option. But with interlude music fresh from the 1920s and a twee, kitchen-table-chat approach, this is news wrapped in a tea cosy.
Coincidence? Guantanamo term ends as Bush's does
It was no coincidence the U.S. military jurors at Guantanamo timed the prison sentence they gave Osama bin Laden's driver to end just before President George W. Bush's term does, legal analysts say.
"My inference is that they concluded that this administration would not release Hamdan at the end of his sentence, but the next one might," said David Glazier, a national security expert who teaches at Loyola Law School.
Paulson says won't stay at Treasury past January
U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said in an interview aired on Sunday he had no interest in staying in his post beyond January when a new administration takes office.
"I'm going to run right up until the end," he said. "I'm focused on getting everything done I can get done between now and January 19th."
In March, Paulson proposed overhauling the U.S. financial regulatory system and giving more powers to the Federal Reserve in the wake of the financial market upheaval that exposed gaping holes in oversight.
Why and How the GOP Made 'Terrorism' America's Number One Export
The GOP exploits terrorism because the GOP is and always has been bankrupt morally and intellectually. A rich party monetarily, the GOP is utterly bereft of ideas or hope. The GOP encouraged fear of communism and was, arguably, it's sole beneficiary. Even so, the GOP, increasingly radical under Ronald Reagan, raised other bogey men: drugs, porn and terrorism.
GOP efforts against porn and drugs would fail, it's own membership being among the worst offenders. With the collapse of the 'Soviet Union', the GOP would be left with a single bogey man: terrorism!
Terrorism is the new bogeyman, the 'ringer' for a communist threat that probable never existed but is beyond credible exploitation. Terrorism is much, much more: it is an ill-defined and incredibly convenient pretext by which the GOP may wage an Orwellian perpetual war, in fact, a series of oil wars, that John McCain says may last '10,000 years'. Terrorism, moreover, has become the convenient means by which all opposition to our fascist regimes are marginalized, demonized, and, in worse cases, silenced forever. Draconian measures insisted upon by Bush authorize him to incarcerate without charges, phone calls or habeas corpus anyone suspected of being a 'terrorist'. That means the 'Bill of Rights' is dead. It means the separation of powers is dead! Coupled with his use of 'signing statements' to rewrite laws, Bush rules by decree.
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