This is No Way to Win a War

Yet another example of the colossal failure that is the so-called "War on Terror" (TM), the Taliban (those folks who are actually responsible for 9/11) has re-siezed control of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

A power vacuum opened the door for militant Muslim clerics, dubbed Pakistani Taliban by the media.

Musharraf says they have no single leader, although they may have ties with the Afghan Taliban chief, Mullah Mohammad Omar.

But Haji Mohammad Omar, a burly, heavily bearded 45-year-old is one of the new forces in South Waziristan.

Residents say his men roam around Wana with rocket launchers mounted on the back of their pick-up trucks.

"We have brought peace in Waziristan. We have eliminated excesses, oppression, robberies and drugs from Waziristan," he told Reuters by telephone from Wana.

The militants have opened offices and set up checkposts in Wana's main market, collecting fees from vehicles entering.

They have even set up a court to conduct summary trials.

Most times the mullahs increase the fine for murders, and executions are rare, although a man convicted of killing his son was shot dead in front of a crowd of 150 tribesmen in late March.

A veteran of the mujahideen guerrilla war against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s, Omar later fought with the Taliban and met al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.

Now, after being granted an amnesty and being paid to stop making trouble in 2004, Omar openly admits recruiting fighters to send them across the border to fight U.S. and Afghan forces.

He accuses Musharraf of "allying with infidels."

Worse still, the vast majority of the deeply conservative and largely illiterate people support this self-styled Taliban of Waziristan, according to intelligence and government officials.

Waziristan's Taliban advise men to grow beards and veil their women, cameras are banned, and the militant mullahs are trying to stop people watching television or listening to music.

What's the point of having a pet dictator when he can't even secure his own country's borders? Apart from proving to the world that we're complete hypocrites who can't find good help?

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Mao was Right this Time

With all the kowtowing that the smirking chimp does for the Chinese dictatorship, you'd think he'd follow Chairman Mao's advice: capture their minds, and their hearts and souls will follow.

We've lost the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people, as Neil Mackay of the UK's Sunday Herald rightly points out in his piece summarizing the recent Pentagon report on the state of the Iraqi occupation:

The Pentagon has admitted that the war on terror and the invasion and occupation of Iraq have increased support for al-Qaeda, made ordinary Muslims hate the US and caused a global backlash against America because of the “self-serving hypocrisy” of George W Bush’s administration over the Middle East.

The mea culpa is contained in a shockingly frank “strategic communications” report, written this autumn by the Defence Science Board for Pentagon supremo Donald Rumsfeld.

On “the war of ideas or the struggle for hearts and minds”, the report says, “American efforts have not only failed, they may also have achieved the opposite of what they intended”.

“American direct intervention in the Muslim world has paradoxically elevated the stature of, and support for, radical Islamists, while diminishing support for the United States to single digits in some Arab societies.”

Referring to the repeated mantra from the White House that those who oppose the US in the Middle East “hate our freedoms”, the report says: “Muslims do not ‘hate our freedoms’, but rather, they hate our policies. The overwhelming majority voice their objections to what they see as one-sided support in favour of Israel and against Palestinian rights, and the long-standing, even increasing support, for what Muslims collectively see as tyrannies, most notably Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan and the Gulf states (emphasis mine).

Surprise, suprise, suprise. Rather than learn from history, the shrub has chosen to repeat it by taking a page from Nixon's failed foreign war playbook. Grab them by the balls and their hearts will follow didn't work in Vietnam and it isn't working in Iraq, either.

Quote of the Week: May 28, 2006

Grab them by the balls and their hearts will follow. – Richard Nixon

9/11. ’nuff said.

(click here for orignal, full-size strip)

Quote of the Week: May 21, 2006

Universal education is the most corroding and disintegrating poison that liberalism has ever invented for its own destruction. – Adolf Hitler

Self-Loathing Mary Cheney Puts the “Bull” in Bulldyke

Mary Cheney, whose father is the puppet master of an administration that has only harmed men and women in uniform more than gay people over the past five-and-a-half years, recently published her memoirs. Therein, she calls John Kerry a "son of a bitch," and John Edwards "total slime" for doing more for her during the 2004 election than either of her parents ever did up until that point: acknowledging that she is, in fact, a lesbian.

A potty-mouth may well be the best thing Mary Cheney's ever going to get from her old man. With the Republicans tanking in the polls generally, and Mr. Cheney himself trailing rectal warts and ghonorrhea in terms of popularity, the "God, guns, and gays" gears of the Republican spin machine have been put into high gear as the mid-terms loom. As if that weren't a sad enough commentary on how expendable Mary Cheney is in her father's eyes, it bears pointing out that prior to being "outed" by the Kerry-Edwards ticket, Mary Cheney's lesbianism wasn't even acknowledged by those who knew better.

As much as I hate to admit it I find myself in total agreement with Andrew Sullivan, who rightly pointed out:

"The Cheneys didn't respond to . . . [Republican senatorial candidate] Alan Keyes' direct insult of their own daughter in Illinois. They have not voiced objections to a single right-wing piece of homophobia in [the 2004] campaign."

Even worse, I find myself in total agreement with Alan Keyes himself. Mary Cheney, you are a selfish hedonist.

Shame on you.

Quote of the Week: May 14, 2006

When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross. – Sinclair Lewis