Older blog entries for berend (starting at number 223)

25 Jul 2004 (updated 25 Jul 2004 at 22:13 UTC) »

Two stories about Arafat you will not find in your newspaper. The first one is Arafat, killing 15 year old boy (Jerusalem Post, registration required I think):

Members of the Arafat-linked terrorist group were trying to plant Kassam rocket launchers next to the Zanin family residence in northern Beit Hanun, when the family, concerned over IDF retaliation, argued and ultimately struggled with the terrorists.

In the ensuing scuffle, the terrorists opened fire on the Zanin family, killing Jamil Zanin, 15, and injuring 5 others. The Kassam crew gathered their launchers and missiles and left the scene. No Kassam rockets have been launched out of Northern Gaza so far Friday.

The second is Arafat is actually building the security fence that Israel, according to the Kangaroo court, may not build:

Palestinian businessmen have made millions of dollars supplying cement for Israel's controversial wall with the full knowledge of Yasser Arafat, the Palestinian leader and one of the wall's most vocal critics.

A damning report by Palestinian legislators, which has been seen by The Sunday Telegraph, concludes that Arafat did nothing to stop the deals although he publicly condemned the structure as a "crime against humanity".

The report claims that the cement was sold with the knowledge of senior officials at the Palestinian ministry of national economy, and close advisers to Arafat.

It concludes that officials were bribed to issue import licences for the cement to importers and businessmen working for Israelis.

That's why I love blogs. News can no longer be ignored or hidden.

I never thought I would write this, but I almost begin to feel sorry for Kerry. The guy has been suckered in. First Joe Wilson, now Sandy Berger. We just got the theft of classified material from the super-secret terrorism files (some of which is still missing), and now his story to the TIMES isn't true either. It was only two years ago that Sandy Berger was promoting to TIME magazine a bold Clinton response to Al Qaeda that had been shelved by the incoming Administration. Here Berger’s testimony (scroll to "A Story Sullivan Likes") last Thursday:

BERGER: Now, the second question you asked—which comes off of the Time magazine story, I think—was there a plan that we turned over to the Bush administration during the transition? I could address that.

The transition, as you will recall, was condensed by virtue of the election in November. I was very focused on using the time that we had—I had been on the other side of a transition with General Scowcroft in 1992. But we used that time very efficiently to convey to my successor the most important information—what was going on and what situations they faced.

Number one among those was terrorism and Al Qaida. And I told that to my successor. She has acknowledged that publicly, so I’m not violating any private conversation. We briefed them fully on what we were doing—on what else was under consideration and what the threat was. I personally attended part of that briefing to emphasize how important that was. But there was no war plan that we turned over to the Bush administration during the transition. And the reports of that are just incorrect.

John Kerry is left gasping:

John Kerry to Tom Brokaw tonight:

Brokaw: "Did you know that [Berger] was under investigation?"

Kerry: "I didn't have a clue, not a clue."

Brokaw: "He didn't share that with you?

Kerry: "I didn't have a clue."

But Clinton knew all about it, for months. We already know that Hillary will run in 2012, but I think she rather would run in 2008. The Clintons have set the phasers to kill. And the dead bodies around Kerry start to pile up.

21 Jul 2004 (updated 21 Jul 2004 at 03:50 UTC) »

Confused about all that Joe Wilson stuff? The Daily Howler as the best summary I've seen for non-American readers who are getting confused by all the denials, rebuttals and who claims what.

Quote:

Let's compare two important statements--Bush's famous 16 words, and Wilson's amazing new admission:

BUSH: The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.

WILSON: I never claimed to have ``debunked'' the allegation that Iraq was seeking uranium from Africa.

Rich Lowry seems to be right:

Sometimes a political figure becomes so hated that he can't do anything right in the eyes of his enemies. President Bush has achieved this rare and exalted status. His critics are so blinded by animus that the internal consistency of their attacks on him no longer matters. For them, Bush is the double-bind president.

...

If he hasn't been able to capture Osama bin Laden, he is endangering U.S. security. If he catches bin Laden, it is only a ploy to influence the elections.

If he ignores U.N. resolutions, he is a dangerous unilateralist. If he takes U.N. resolutions on Iraq seriously, he is a dangerous unilateralist. If he doesn't get France to agree to his Iraq policy, he is ignoring important international actors. If he supports multiparty talks on North Korea, he is not doing enough to ignore important international actors.

...

If he warns of a terror attack, he is playing alarmist politics. If he doesn't warn of a terror attack, he is dangerously asleep at the switch. If he says we're safer, he's lying, and if he doesn't say we're safer, he's implicitly admitting that he has failed in his core duty as commander in chief.

...

If he sticks with Dick Cheney, he is saddling himself with an unpopular vice president, giving Democrats who can't wait to run against Cheney a political advantage. If he drops Cheney, he is admitting that the Democratic attacks against his vice president have hit home, thus giving Democrats who have made those charges a political advantage.

If he loses in November, the voice of the American people has spoken a devastating verdict on his presidency. If he wins, he stole the election.

It's sad.

But in case people think there is no real bipartisan political humor anymore, watch this.

I thought John Kerry would finish the job in Iraq. He voted for it, and now he is against the war. And I get really sick when he is talking about his allies that must be involved. What allies are not involved? Does my country, The Netherlands, not count? England, Australia, Italy, Poland, all part of a fraudulent coalition? I really really hate that kind of talk.

But of course, we have another American that knows what is good for the rest of the world. Michael Moore calling for regime change in those countries. Regime change starts at home Mikey, try it first there. But you will fail miserably, partly thnx to your 'documentary'.

I hope the US doesn't get a president that calls the countries that went to war with the US "part of a fraudulent coalition".

11 Jul 2004 (updated 11 Jul 2004 at 23:09 UTC) »
John Kerry and John Edwards, this touchy stuff doesn't work for me I must say.

async, a couple of points on Eiffel:

  1. There is a #eiffel channel on irc.freenode.net.
  2. The !! (bang bang) syntax is obsolete, use create instead
  3. Arrays can have any index you like:
      create my_array.make (0, 99)
    
    gives you a 0..99 array.
  4. You don't want to know if something is a funcall or not. Anyway, you can redefine a fun into an attribute, so it's a meaningless distinction in Eiffel.
5 Jul 2004 (updated 5 Jul 2004 at 19:54 UTC) »

As I will be investing (eh betting :-)) quite some money in the US presidential campaign, I agree with Raph that Fahrenheit 911 is an important movie.

But unless Raph, I think it is going to have the opposite effect. First, it's funny to read the reviews.

But in the end, deception never works. Americans will get to know about the 59 deceits in Fahrenheit 911. So far Moore's army of lawyers hasn't reacted...

Take for example this:

In terms of marketing the film, Front Row is getting a boost from organizations related to Hezbollah which have rung up from Lebanon to ask if there is anything they can do to support the film. And although [Front Row’s Managing Director Giancarlo] Chacra says he and his company feel strongly that Fahrenheit is not anti-American, but anti-Bush, “we can’t go against these organizations as they could strongly boycott the film in Lebanon and Syria.”

Yes, that's right. Read Moore's reaction to this accusation. Oops.

And will the dark horse win? Dick Morris, a former Clinton advisor, doesn't seem to think so. Look at the latest NBC/Wall Street Journal poll: 57 percent of the respondents say they know a lot or a fair amount about Kerry," reports NBC's Mark Murray. That's "a real drop from 68 percent in the NBC/Journal March survey." The voters actually know less about Kerry the more the campaign progresses. What's that for a strategy?

Anyway, I'm satisfied that Kerry will not run from Iraq, so the second democracy in the Middle East will get a real chance. And that is what this is all about: change the environments that breed terrorists and where terrorists can hide.

4 Jul 2004 (updated 4 Jul 2004 at 23:35 UTC) »

First task: how can I backup my entire diary?

UPDATE: with:

  wget http://www.advogato.org/person/berend/diary.xml

The biggest scandal in the history of men is the UN Oil-for-Food scandal. At 40 billion it's far bigger than Enron for example. But you don't fool Sherlock Holmes!.

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