‘Zionism's drive to create a state for the Jewish people was designed to serve two purposes. The most fundamental of them was to provide a refuge that would ensure the well-being and security of the Jewish people, wherever they were endangered by the ever-recurring historical cycles of murderous global anti-Semitism - most recently, of course, the Holocaust. Beyond that, the Jewish state of Israel was to be a moral exemplar for all mankind, "a light unto the nations," the model of the kind of state that a liberal, well educated, sophisticated, and morally sensitive people - "the people of the Book" - could create.

‘In his State of the Union address to the nation, President George W. Bush made some disturbingly inaccurate statements about the fight against terrorism that distort the threat's reality. He continues to hail the break-up of the al-Qaida terror network as a major victory, and he has now conflated the Islamist Sunni and Shia terror organizations, misrepresenting them as a unified force against the United States.

from the Sydney Morning Herald …..

‘Photos & articles depicting Saddam Hussein's execution shown to inmates at Guantanamo Bay, including David Hicks, were provided for their "intellectual stimulation", the US military said.

The existence of the display of the articles & photos, & an accompanying message saying liars would meet the same fate, garnered international headlines after they were revealed by Mr Hicks's legal team on Thursday.

from the Centre for American Progress …..

‘Three years ago, President Bush delivered the State of the Union containing the infamous 16 words that alleged Iraq was developing a nuclear program. During the following summer, the insurgency was picking up steam, the search for WMD had turned up nothing, whistleblowers like former Ambassador Joseph Wilson were beginning to question the administration's motives, and the White House was hitting back against its critics.

Bushit said on Wednesday "I don't feel abandoned" by fellow Republicans in Congress who are working with Democrats to protest his Iraq policy with a congressional resolution.

In a television interview, the great deciderarean shrugged off criticism of his plan to surge 21,500 more US troops in Iraq & said he hoped lawmakers would give US forces what they needed to get the job done.

‘A US Ambassador lashed out against a foreign official last week for standing up to the Bush administration - and it wasn't against Hugo Chavez or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or any of the other usual suspects.

It was Canadian Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day - a fundamentalist creationist, anti-abortion, anti-gay rights hawk who once spoke at a "Canadians for Bush" rally. At the onset of the Iraq war, he published a pro-Bush letter in the Wall Street Journal with Stephen Harper, who would become Canada's prime minister in 2006. Day and Harper blasted their own government's opposition to the U.S. invasion and lauded the Bush administration's "fundamental vision of civilization and human values."

‘Iraq is in negotiations with San Ramon-based Chevron Corp. and Exxon Mobil Corp. to build a new $3 billion petrochemical facility, and is in talks with several other Western companies over industrial projects.

In an interview Thursday, Fowzi Hariri, Iraq's minister for industry and minerals, said the discussions with Chevron and Exxon began this week in Washington and are at an early stage.

‘Another day, yet another scandal involving the saintly Tony Blair and highly connected Anglo-American arms peddlers. The British prime minister, who, like George W. Bush, has made his sleeve-worn Christianity a major component of his political persona, is knee-deep in a corruption probe once again, just weeks after peremptorily quashing an official investigation into bribes, kickbacks and influence-peddling allegations involving his government, his corporate cronies and the Saudi royals. (See "War Profits Trump the Rule of Law" Truthout.org, December 22).

‘President George W. Bush concluded his annual State of the Union address this week with the words “the State of our Union is strong … our cause in the world is right … and tonight that cause goes on.” Maybe so, but the state of the Bush administration is at its worst yet, according to the latest NEWSWEEK poll. The president’s approval ratings are at their lowest point in the poll’s history—30 percent—and more than half the country (58 percent) say they wish the Bush presidency were simply over, a sentiment that is almost unanimous among Democrats (86 percent), and is shared by a clear majority (59 percent) of independents and even one in five (21 percent) Republicans. Half (49 percent) of all registered voters would rather see a Democrat elected president in 2008, compared to just 28 percent who’d prefer the GOP to remain in the White House.’

"What should we call someone who believes the government is above the law, that opinion should be standardised, that majorities are born to rule, that minorities endanger social cohesion? [Perhaps] un-Australian?"

Donald Horne

‘America’s dry drunk of a president knows diddlysquat about, and lacks respect for history, economics, and the normal folk like you and me. What he does know and respect is how to cheat, lie and connive his way towards being the big man in the frat house.

I’ve got news for Frat Boy. The White House is not a Delta Kappa Epsilon outpost let alone its head office.

‘In September 2006, the Attorney-General went to Washington to discuss revised military arrangements for the trial of suspects such as Mr Hicks. It was reported widely that these allowed evidence obtained through coercion to be admitted at trial. On his return to Australia, Mr Ruddock told the ABC’s “Insiders” program that sleep deprivation should be permitted as “coercion” rather than torture. He was immediately challenged by the National President of the RSL (who said it could certainly be torture), the Chief of the Australian Defence Force, and Federal Police Commissioner Keelty who said sleep deprivation was illegal for use by AFP officers, and amounted to “unfair tactics”.

‘The President took us into this war recklessly.  He disregarded warnings from the national security adviser during the first Gulf War, the chief of staff of the army, two former commanding generals of the Central Command, whose jurisdiction includes Iraq, the director of operations on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and many, many others with great integrity and long experience in national security affairs.  We are now, as a nation, held hostage to the predictable – and predicted – disarray that has followed.