billions for killing Iraqis okay

• Serious post regarding S-CHIP for those interested...see inside - Observer
  • billions for killing Iraqis okay - reveille
    • Did you even read the post??? - Observer
  • Thanks for posting - DW
    • I have to be honest, DW.... - Observer
      • Thanks for being honest, I completely agree - DW
  • Aren't you the one who WANTS states - to have more control? (kam) sm
    • S-CHIP - Observer

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See link for entire article.

Meanwhile, Tuesday, Officials said insurgents were trying to deepen the political turmoil surrounding the contested vote. Preliminary figures have given a big lead to the religious Shiite bloc that controls the current interim government.

The new violence came as three opposition groups threatened a wave of protests and civil disobedience if fraud charges are not properly investigated. The warning came from the secular Iraqi National List, headed by former Shiite Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, and two Sunni Arab groups.

More than 10,000 people, some carrying photos of Allawi, demonstrated Tuesday in favor of a government that would give more power to Sunni Arabs and secular Shiites. Marches chanted No Sunnis, no Shiites, yes for national unity.

We're protesting to reject the elections fraud. We want to ask the government and the elections commission: 'Where did our votes go? Who stole them?' said Abdul Hamid Abdul Razzaq, a 45-year-old barber who attended the massive protest.

A similar protest in Baqouba ended with arrests. Police rounded up several people — most of them high school students — and took them into custody, Donelan reports.

Iraq's Electoral Commission said Monday that final results for the 275-seat parliament could be released in about a week.

Sunni Arab and secular Shiite factions are demanding that an international body review more than 1,500 complaints, warning they may boycott the new legislature. They also want new elections in some provinces, including Baghdad. The United Nations has rejected an outside review.

We will resort to peaceful options, including protests, civil disobedience and a boycott of the political process until our demands are met, said Hassan Zaidan al-Lahaibi of the Sunni-dominated Iraqi Front for National Dialogue. He spoke in neighboring Jordan, where representatives of the groups have met in recent days.

The election commission considers 35 of the complaints serious enough to change some local results. But Farid Ayar, a commission official, said there was no reason to cancel the entire election.

He also said preliminary results from early votes by soldiers, hospital patients, prisoners and overseas Iraqis showed a coalition of Kurdish parties and the main Shiite religious bloc each taking about a third. Those nearly 500,000 votes were not expected to alter overall results significantly.

Preliminary results previously released gave the United Iraqi Alliance, the religious Shiite coalition dominating the current government, a big lead — but one unlikely to allow it to govern without forming a coalition with other groups.

Alliance leader Abdul Aziz al-Hakim traveled to the northern Kurdish city of Irbil on Tuesday to discuss the formation of a governing coalition with Jalal Talabani, Iraq's Kurdish president, and Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdish region.

Al-Hakim's secretary Haitham al-Husseini said there would also be negotiations with Sunni Arabs. Al-Husseini said the Alliance has proposed distributing the top six Cabinet positions, the three-member presidency council and top three parliament slots among the political blocs.

dollars being given away to Wall Street crooks with absolutely NO accounting as to who is getting how much, yet the MOST important Americans (again, IMHO) are the troops who are sacrificing their lives for us, and they receive the least in return.

I'm copying and pasting the text of the article below.  The interview, I believe, is very powerful, but at least if I can copy the text, you'll have some notion of what this is about.

(May I just say God bless you and your husband and your entire family.  I hope he returns to you soon.)

---

CBS: KBR knowingly exposed troops to toxic dust

A CBS News investigation has obtained evidence that a subsidiary of Halliburton, the giant energy company formerly headed by Vice President (bad word - can't post) Cheney, knowingly exposed United States soldiers to toxic materials in Iraq.

CBS interviewed Commander James Gentry of the Indiana National Guard, who is dying of a rare form of lung cancer that he believes is the result of "months of inhaling hexavalent chromium" after his battalion was assigned in April 2003 to protect contractors from Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR) working in Iraq at a local water plant. Other members of his unit are also suffering from cancers or rashes associated with the toxic chemical, which was all over the plant.

"We didn't question what we were doing," a grief-stricken Gentry told CBS. "We just knew we had to provide a security service for the KBR. ... We would never have been there if we would have known."

CBS has obtained documents which indicate that KBR knew about the danger months before the soldiers were informed. KBR employee depositions show there were "concerns about the toxins in one part of the plant as early as May of 2003," while later minutes detail symptoms of exposure, including bloody noses and rashes.

It wasn't until the end of August that the Indiana National Guardsmen were informed that the plant was contaminated, and some say they have only just learned about it this year.

Indiana Senator Evan Bayh told CBS, "I think the burden of proof at this point is on the company to come forward and very forthrightly explain what happened, why we should trust them, and why the health and well-being of our soldiers should continue to be in their hands."

KBR has issued a statement saying, "We deny the assertion that KBR harmed troops and was responsible for an unsafe condition."

KBR, which was spun off by Halliburton in 2007 as a separate corporation, has previously been accused of providing contaminated water to troops in Iraq, taking kickbacks, and sending workers to Iraq against their will.

The full CBS story can be read here.


This video is from CBS's Evening News, broadcast Dec. 22, 2008.

 This is over and above the new so-called stimulus package.

In my local newspaper, it states "More proposals waiting in wings" then it goes on to state "The obama adminstration is developing proposals to help rescue the banking system that could cost taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars beyond the $700 bililion bailout Congress already has approved.

Details are still being worked out but the administration is looking to spend hundreds of billions more to address the foreclosure crisis, help banks get out from under weighty bad assets and expand liquidity programs."

I'm really starting to get sick literally over this. We can't spend billions of dollars when the money isn't coming into the treasury.  We can't printing money without anything to back it up.

If any of you think these packages will not help the economy, please, I'm almost begging you, email or call your reps and get it stopped.

...and they look like such nice boys.....

I have never said I defend Hezbollah.  I don't defend Hezbollah.  They're terrorists, and they're horrible.

But blindly defending Israel, regardless of what they do, doesn't work for me either.  What is most disquieting to me is that you defend Israel's placement of landmines to kill innocent civilians, designed to go off at a later date when people least expect it?  Why don't you consider that terrorism, as well?

NM

That's first and foremost in his mind, and Americans can go to hell, as far as he's concerned.

He thinks the war is more important than anything, including funding of projects to prevent a hurricane from destroying vulnerables, including funding border patrols, including forcing Americans to go broke just because they want to stay warm in the winter.

I overheard a conversation last night in a store.  A woman was complaining of gas prices and said she didn't know if she'd be able to afford to heat her home this winter.  Another woman told her about Jessie Jackson and his visit to Chavez and Chavez' offer to help low-income Americans with heating fuel.

This woman (who reminded me very much of some of you who post here, always in attack mode) said she and her children would FREEZE before she'd take any welfare from a communist.  She then went on a tirade about the kind of people who receive welfare (not fit to print on a public forum like this).  I was shocked, and the first three things that popped in my mind were Jim Jones, David Koresh and PEOPLE LIKE YOU.

Is there any length you people WON'T go to to defend this idiot president who doesn't care enough about YOU to make gasoline and heating oil affordable? 

Not easy to watch, but if she's for this, then I'm against her.

https://secure.defenders.org/site/Donation2?idb=0&df_id=1547&1547.donation=form1&s_src=6JY08WDC4F&s_subsrc=6JY08WDC4F_EJI08D1web