Next Target Iran.

[maineman]

Many Germans were murdered - so were many in Saddam's own family

you are not making any sense.....

you obviously cannot deny the fact that women had a higher literacy rate in Iraq than elsewhere in the middle east nor that they had a higher pay equity in the workforce.

Are you suggesting that women were victims of violence in Iraq in some significantly greater rate than in the rest of the arab and islamic world? If so, please site your statistics to back up such an assertion.

 

[red states rule]

you are not making any sense.....

you obviously cannot deny the fact that women had a higher literacy rate in Iraq than elsewhere in the middle east nor that they had a higher pay equity in the workforce.

Are you suggesting that women were victims of violence in Iraq in some significantly greater rate than in the rest of the arab and islamic world? If so, please site your statistics to back up such an assertion.

Keep defending America's enemies and being a traitor. You are part of the YELLOW DOG Dems

 

[maineman]

Keep defending America's enemies and being a traitor. You are part of the YELLOW DOG Dems

I am defending no one... can you refute the facts that I have stated, yes or no?

 

[red states rule]

I am defending no one... can you refute the facts that I have stated, yes or no?

I have. You are to big an idiot to understand them

 

[red states rule]

« Don’t Overlook Sam BrownbackNew Hampshire, Welcome To The Nanny State 2 »Murtha’s “Slow Bleed” Stumbles Out Of The Gate
This is from washingtonpost.com:

Murtha Stumbles on Iraq Funding Curbs

Democrats Were Ill-Prepared for Unplanned Disclosure, Republican Attacks

By Jonathan Weisman and Lyndsey Layton

Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, February 25, 2007; Page A05

The plan was bold: By tying President Bush’s $100 billion war request to strict standards of troop safety and readiness, Democrats believed they could grab hold of Iraq war policy while forcing Republicans to defend sending troops into battle without the necessary training or equipment.

But a botched launch by the plan’s author, Rep. John P. Murtha (Pa.), has united Republicans and divided Democrats, sending the latter back to the drawing board just a week before scheduled legislative action, a score of House Democratic lawmakers said last week.

“If this is going to be legislation that’s crafted in such a way that holds back resources from our troops, that is a non-starter, an absolute non-starter,” declared Rep. Jim Matheson (Utah), a leader of the conservative Blue Dog Democrats.

Murtha’s credentials as a Marine combat veteran, a critic of the war and close ally of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) were supposed to make him an unassailable spokesman for Democratic war policy. Instead, he has become a lightning rod for criticism from Republicans and members of his own party.

Freshman Rep. Joe Sestak (D-Pa.), a retired Navy admiral who was propelled into politics by the Iraq war, said Murtha could still salvage elements of his strategy, but Sestak, an outspoken war opponent, is “a bit wary” of a proposal that would influence military operations.

“I was recently in the military, and I have to speak from that experience,” Sestak said.

The story of Murtha’s star-crossed plan illustrates the Democratic Party’s deep divisions over the Iraq war and how the new House majority has yet to establish firm control over Congress. From the beginning, Murtha acted on his own to craft a complicated legislative strategy on the war, without consulting fellow Democrats. When he chose to roll out the details on a liberal, antiwar Web site on Feb. 15, he caught even Pelosi by surprise while infuriating Democrats from conservative districts.

Then for an entire week, as members of Congress returned home for a recess, Murtha refused to speak further. Democratic leaders failed to step into the vacuum, and Republicans relentlessly attacked a plan they called a strategy to slowly bleed the war of troops and funds. By the end of the recess, Murtha’s once promising strategy was in tatters.

Tom Andrews, a former House member and antiwar activist who helped Murtha with his Internet rollout, fumed: “The issue to me is, what is the state of the backbone of the Democratic Party? How will they respond to this counterattack? Republicans are throwing touchdown passes on this because the Democrats aren’t even on the field.”

Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, a Florida Democrat and deputy whip, said party leaders are working on several Iraq proposals and that Murtha’s may survive. Finding consensus will be difficult but not impossible, she said. “This is a multi-step process,” she cautioned. “At least we’re debating the topic, not blindly following the president.”

Megan Grote, Murtha’s spokeswoman, said the congressman will not discuss Iraq policy until a news conference scheduled for the end of the week.

Murtha, 74, the powerful chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee on defense, still holds a unique position on war policy, stemming from his roots as a veteran, his close ties to the uniformed military and his long-standing alliance with Pelosi. When he first publicly called for ending the war in 2005, he commanded the attention the party’s left and right wings.

The strategy he would craft was designed to calm the nerves of the party’s conservatives by fully funding the war, while placating the antiwar left by attaching so many strings to those funds that the president would not be able to deploy all the 21,500 additional combat troops he wanted.

To be sent to battle, troops would have to have had a year’s rest between combat tours. Soldiers in Iraq could not have their tours extended beyond a year there. And the Pentagon’s “stop-loss” policy, which prevents some officers from leaving the military when their service obligations are up, would end. Troops would have to be trained in counterinsurgency and urban warfare and be sent overseas with the equipment they used in training.

Pelosi endorsed the plan in concept but never the details. The plan surfaced Feb. 15 in an unorthodox Murtha appearance on MoveCongress.org, an antiwar Web site affiliated with the liberal activists of MoveOn.org.

It came the day before the House voted on a nonbinding resolution opposing Bush’s additional troop deployments that Democratic leaders had been touting as a major rebuke. Murtha dismissed that vote as he promoted his coming plans regarding the war spending bill. “This vote will be the most important vote in changing the direction on this war,” he said of his proposal. “This vote will limit the options of the president and should stop the surge.”

To many Democrats, that was not only impolitic, it was disloyal.

“He stepped all over Speaker Pelosi’s message of support for the troops,” said Rep. Jim Cooper (Tenn.). “That was not team play, to put it mildly.”

Even after that Web appearance, some senior Democratic aides say Murtha might well have been able to save his plan if he had quickly laid it out before the Democratic caucus and marshaled Democratic leaders behind a defense. Instead, the House recessed for a week, Murtha disappeared from the media, and Democratic leaders were silent, saying they could not discuss Iraq legislation because no real plan existed.

In the face of an unanswered Republican assault, the Democratic rank-and-file cracked — on the left and the right.

“While we’re all for troop readiness, we’re all for them having all the equipment they want,” Matheson, the Utah Democrat, said, “I’d be very concerned about doing anything that would hamstring resources and commanders on the ground.”

Indeed, Matheson and other Blue Dogs said the Democrats should concentrate on oversight hearings on Iraq policy, while refraining from binding legislation on the war.

The party’s newly elected Iraq veterans favor a more straightforward approach than Murtha, establishing a legal timetable for pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq, Sestak said. And the party’s antiwar left is no less unhappy with what they see as half measures from Murtha.

“Congress has the authority, and I know it has the responsibility, to get us out of there. And we should use every means possible,” said Rep. Lynn Woolsey (Calif.), a co-chairman of the Out of Iraq Caucus.

Rep. Barbara Lee (Calif.), another co-chairman who sits on the Appropriations Committee, is likely to try to tie the war spending bill to legislation demanding a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq by a date certain, with the bill’s money available only for the safe withdrawal of the troops.

Such legislation was precisely what Murtha hoped to head off with his recent Internet appearance, said Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.), who helped connect him with MoveCongress.org. And Moran still believes the appearance ultimately will work to the Democrats’ favor. “The cognoscenti is upset because he’s not under their control,” Moran said. “They would prefer he release his plan to a think tank, but he decided he wanted to communicate directly. He doesn’t trust the way the media filters what he says and does. He understands the power of being able to communicate.”

http://mpinkeyes.wordpress.com/2007/02/25/murthas-slow-bleed-stumbles-out-of-the-gate/

 

[maineman]

I have. You are to big an idiot to understand them

you hve refuted the fact that women's literacy was higher in Iraq than in other Islamic countries? please provide a link.

 

[red states rule]

you hve refuted the fact that women's literacy was higher in Iraq than in other Islamic countries? please provide a link.

Iraqi Women Brutalized by Saddam
February 11, 2003
by Wendy McElroy, [email protected]


Before and after Sept. 11, politically correct feminists crusaded for Afghan women oppressed by the Taliban. By contrast, little outrage has been expressed over the treatment of Iraqi women under Saddam Hussein.

The silence may be currently appropriate -- feminist goals should play no role in forming foreign policy. But the contrast between the two reactions is puzzling, especially in the face of horror stories coming out of Iraq.

Amnesty International has documented the brutal executions of Iraqi women accused of prostitution. For example, Najat Mohammad Haydar, an obstetrician in Baghdad, was beheaded in October 2000 after criticizing corruption within local health services. According to another report, in October 2000 "a group of men led by Saddam Hussein's son Uday, beheaded with knives 50 young women in Baghdad. The heads of these women were hung on the doors of their houses for a few days."

The Iraq Foundation joins Amnesty International in chronicling human rights violations, such as the methods of torture in prison, which include rape and "bringing in a female relative, especially the wife or the mother, and raping her in front of the detainee."

Why then does the Feminist Majority site have a "Help Afghan Women" button but no "Help Iraqi Women?" Why does an Oct. 10, 2002 press release from NOW warn, "A U.S. invasion of Iraq will likely entail ... dangers to the safety and rights of Iraqi women who currently enjoy more rights and freedoms than women in other Gulf nations, such as Saudi Arabia."

Why does Women's eNews run an article by Yasmine Bahrani who states, "As it happens, women's equality is one of the few aspects of the nation's ruling ideology ... that has survived the brutality that has marked Iraqi political life."

The theme seems to be that Saddam may brutally violate human rights but his presence is good for women. For example, the Bahrani article mentions "a recent report" compiled under the auspices of the United Nations in which Iraq "scored highest in women's empowerment" for that region. (Saddam's motives are not mentioned. "Advances," such as mandating five years' maternity leave for women from employers and equal pay with men allowed him both to curry favor with the West and to regulate the economy.)

Without making a case for or against war, I question PC feminism's comparative silence on Iraqi women. The Bahrani article reveals one reason why. It points readers who wish more information to the Iraq Foundation site, which contradicts the article by stating: "The rights of women in Iraq are going down the drain, along with everything else ... In 1998, Saddam ordered all women secretaries working in government agencies be dismissed. Now there are new laws barring women from work altogether."

What is the truth of the situation? The horror stories are starting to mount. On Oct. 4, 2002, seven Iraqi women of different regional, ethnic and religious backgrounds sat on a panel entitled "The Unheard Voices of Iraqi Women." They recounted their personal stories of brutalization under Saddam's regime.

One of the women eloquently stated, "The Iraqi woman has endured torture, murder, confinement, execution, and banishment, just like other in Iraqi society at the hands of Saddam Hussein's criminal gang." She added, "the Iraqi woman has lost her loved ones -- husbands, brothers and fathers." So much for the notion that Saddam can massively violate human rights while protecting those of women.

PC feminism has not ignored such testimony but neither has it embraced the cause of women in Iraq as it did those in Afghanistan.

Several reasons may underlie this apparent reluctance. A condemnation of Saddam may be viewed as an admission that Bush is correct on Iraq. And hatred of Bush runs deep in most feminist circles.

Moreover, the sheer cost of war with Iraq is seen to threaten funding to "pro-woman" causes within the United States in a manner that the Afghanistan conflict did not. This threat was one of two arguments presented against war with Iraq in NOW's Oct. 10 press release. (The second: Invasion might disrupt the rights women allegedly enjoy.)

Regarding money, NOW Action Vice President Olga Vives stated: "As has happened during previous wars, funds will be diverted from ... vitally needed social programs from an already downsized budget. Women will bear the greatest burden of any decrease in domestic spending in order to finance war."

Another source of reluctance could be that condemning Iraq's treatment of women could raise doubts about the accuracy the United Nations' reports, such as the one cited by Bahrani. PC feminism is deeply invested in such U.N. agencies as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination (CEDAW) to which Iraq became a signatory in the '80s.

Activists like Katrin Michael may force feminism to ask uncomfortable questions. Born in a Kurdish area of Iraq, Michael survived the infamous chemical attacks that Saddam used against his own people. Now lobbying in the United States, she is starting to receive attention from PC feminists.

Perhaps they will realize that to roundly condemn Saddam is not to argue for war. It simply gives justice to those Iraqi women who can no longer speak for themselves.

http://www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2003/0211.html

 

[glockmail]

the fact is: women's literacy and job-pay equity in Iraq prior to our invasion was higher than anywhere else in the Islamic world.

Compare shitty to shittier? I guess that's OK when you're a limp wristed liberal.

 

[glockmail]

do you have any data to support your assertion that the mortality rate for women in Iraq was statistically higher than any other country in the region?

I didn't think so.

Good point. Were the rape rooms less active in other countries?

 

[glockmail]

I post facts: women's literacy in pre-invasion Iraq was higher than anywhere else in the Islamic world...women's pay equity was higher in pre-invasion Iraq than anywhere else in the Islamic world...

... .

Bullshit. Back it up.

 

[maineman]

Compare shitty to shittier? I guess that's OK when you're a limp wristed liberal.

I merely make the point that the demonization of Saddam and Iraq in order to justify our invasion of that country when they had no connection to the attack on our country, when such an invasion has put the entire region into turmoil, is based upon false and misleading emotional arguments put together like a house of cards.

 

[glockmail]

are you suggesting that women were significantly less safe in Iraq than they were in other islamic countries? Or are you denying the fact that they had greater socioeconomic opportunities in Iraq than elsewhere in the Islamic world?

Again, comapre shitty with shittier. And where's your backup to your SUPPOSED FACTS?

 

[glockmail]

you are saying that in Nazi Germany, Aryan men and women were targets?

WTF does that have to do with Iraq?

 

[glockmail]

I merely make the point that the demonization of Saddam and Iraq in order to justify our invasion of that country when they had no connection to the attack on our country, when such an invasion has put the entire region into turmoil, is based upon false and misleading emotional arguments put together like a house of cards.

That's BS. I've already given you 54 sources that prove the connection. Are you incapable of reading?

 

[maineman]

Good point. Were the rape rooms less active in other countries?

so we invade countries around the globe, conquer them, occupy them every time the number of rapes reaches some magical annual limit? why have I never heard of that policy before?

 

[maineman]

Again, comapre shitty with shittier. And where's your backup to your SUPPOSED FACTS?

why don't YOU post some facts to disprove my assertions. If you are so sure I am wrong, you could easily find some non-partisan source to disprvoe me.

I'll wait.

 

[maineman]

That's BS. I've already given you 54 sources that prove the connection. Are you incapable of reading?

you gave me 54 sources - many of them op-ed peieces...many of them single sources of dubious or already discredited authenticity ...that ALLEGE a connection. YOu don't have the foggiest idea what the word "prove" means.

 

[maineman]

That's BS. I've already given you 54 sources that prove the connection. Are you incapable of reading?

and single source meetings between AQ members and Iraqis after 9/11 are not PROOF of a connection between Saddam and 9/11.... moron.

 

[maineman]

WTF does that have to do with Iraq?

follow the thread....it was in response to a post from one of your buddies that first mentioned the treatment of women in Nazi germany.

Do try to keep up.

 

[glockmail]

so we invade countries around the globe, conquer them, occupy them every time the number of rapes reaches some magical annual limit? why have I never heard of that policy before?

You can just tell them to fuck off and pound sand.