When it comes to reports on a variety of issues to do with Iraq, the best policy is always to ensure that you get to ‘proof read’ them first. Be it the upcoming report due by General Petraeus to Congress - who was actually just quoted in an Australian newspaper as saying that the surge is working, though being vague enough as to leave the door open for others to suggest that efforts should continue - to the leaked draft of the upcoming Government Accountability Office report, which is dismal in its assessment, the administration’s continual suggestion that awaiting the ‘final product’ is necessary to get the whole picture is laughable.

With regards to the draft copy of the GAO report leaked to the Washington Post…

“The person who provided the draft report to The Post said it was being conveyed from a government official who feared that its pessimistic conclusions would be watered down in the final version — as some officials have said happened with security judgments in this month’s National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq. Congress requested the GAO report, along with an assessment of the Iraqi security forces by an independent commission headed by retired Marine Gen. James L. Jones, to provide a basis for comparison with the administration’s scorecard. The Jones report is also scheduled for delivery next week.”

The White House’s response to this was, as one might expect, the usual regurgitation of we listen to the people on the ground…

“Asked to comment on the GAO draft, White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said, “General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker are there on the ground every day in Iraq, and it’s important to wait to hear what they have to say.”

Given General Petraeus’ statement in the afore mentioned Australian daily, it’s pretty reasonable to assume that his report to Congress is going to favour the administration’s objectives. But that doesn’t mean that within the military hierarchy there aren’t those that have grave concerns…

“The professional military guys are going to the non-professional military guys and saying ‘Resolve this,’” said Jeffrey White, a military analyst for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “That’s what it sounds like.”

White said it suggests that the military commanders want to be able to distance themselves from Iraq strategy by making it clear that whatever course is followed is the president’s decision, not what commanders agreed on.”

[…]

“Pentagon commanders are known to be divided over how to proceed in Iraq.

Pentagon officials have told McClatchy Newspapers that Casey, who was the top commander in Iraq, wants the U.S. to draw down forces and focus on training the Iraqi forces, as it did during his tenure in Iraq, and worries about the strain the war is having on the Army.

Earlier this week, the Los Angeles Times reported that Pace would recommend reducing the number of troops in Baghdad because the deployments are straining the military.

Petraeus, however, is expected to argue that the number of U.S. troops should be kept at their current levels, saying that the increase in U.S. forces this year is beginning to reduce sectarian violence.”

More from Crooks And Liars.

It’s no laughing matter. Maps are a quintessential part of the educational process. Without maps how are our children supposed to know where they are, let alone where everyone else is? How are intrepid youths that have chosen to take a year off between high school and college supposed to know how to find Europe, let alone backpack around it? Unfortunately, even though we possess advanced tools such as Google Maps and Google Earth, Map Quest, and even highly advanced GPS systems in new automobiles – the reality is that a lot of young people simply have no clue where they are.

This crisis requires that we act for the sake of our children.

Please view the following video and help take part in a brave new initiative to ensure that our children not only know where they are, but where they’re not.

You can also check out the official MatthewGood.org Rudimentary Beginners Map Of The World by clicking the image below…

One hundred years ago, on 31 August 1907, diplomats representing Edward VII and Tsar Nicholas II met in St. Petersburg to sign the Anglo-Russian Convention. Officially titled the Convention of Mutual Cordiality, the entente was designed to stabilize relations between the British and Tsarist empires in Central Asia and to check German ambitions in the region. While it acknowledged a de facto British protectorate over Afghanistan and affirmed Tibet’s status as a ‘buffer state’ under the suzerainty of China, its most important provision related to Iran, or Persia as it was then known in the West. Despite the accord’s stated aim to maintain the integrity of the shah’s kingdom, the contracting parties divided the country into official British and Russian spheres of influence with a neutral zone in between. A proud nation emerged from 1907 as no more than the latest victim of the two expanding imperial powers.

Today, the Anglo-Russian Convention can rightly be considered a diplomatic disaster. Not only did it fail abysmally in its main objective of alleviating tensions between the two signatories in Central Asia— the ‘Great Game’ continued unabated— but it worsened relations with Germany and made the First World War all the more likely. Those failures are serious enough but there were more. The entente has blighted British-Iranian relations for a century and today we continue to pay for its mistakes.

Signed without the knowledge, let alone the approval, of the Persian government of the day, Iran was officially informed of the Anglo-Russian Convention in mid-September 1907. Quite understandably, the announcement of the treaty was greeted with profound resentment in the streets of Tehran. Of the two targets for Iranian ire, however, abuse was directed overwhelmingly at Britain. While little had been hoped of autocratic Russia, with its long history of encroaching upon Iranian sovereignty, Britain had seemed another matter. The betrayal by an admired constitutional monarchy was deeply felt and would be bitterly recalled.

Anger was all the more acute since the accord came on the heels of Iran’s constitutional revolution, the first in the Middle East and a movement initially championed by Britain. Since London had encouraged the constitutionalists in their struggle with the autocratic shah and welcomed the creation of a majlis, or parliament, in 1906, many patriotic Iranians had counted on British sympathy. After the announcement of the Anglo-Russian Convention, however, the Persian press widely condemned Britain for having usurped from Russia the title of “enemy of civilization and justice.”

As the Iranian historian Firuz Kazemzadeh trenchantly observed, “It was in September 1907 that the modern Persian image of England crystallized … Justifiably or not, most Persians would, from then on, be prepared to believe only the worst of England.” No longer considered a moral force for good, it became a symbol of foreign tyranny and in the years following 1907 many Iranians came to view the British as “a cynical people totally indifferent to the sufferings of the rest of mankind, buying and selling entire nations, trading in opium, purposely starving millions of its colonial subjects, and secretly controlling the destinies of the world.” This conclusion summarized a bitter loss of faith.

Today opinion remains much the same. During a July 2007 research trip, I regularly encountered ordinary Iranians who, even if half-jokingly, invoked a hundred-year old memory of betrayal. One of the country’s most popular television series of all time evokes the common sentiment. Based on the 1970 novel, My Uncle Napoleon (Dai Jan Napoleon) by Iraj Pezeshkzad, the masterful satire televized the life of a family patriarch, an Iranian patriot who sees the hand of the British everywhere and feels a deep affinity with their historic enemy, Napoleon. Pezeshkzad’s choice of anglophobia as the major comic device resonates strongly with audiences. Iranians remain ready to hold Britain responsible for many of the world’s ills. From the perspective of outsiders, this tendency can approach the ridiculous. For example, for many years after 1979, it was not uncommon to encounter Iranians who suspected the British of involvement in the Islamic Revolution itself and the overthrow of the shah. In a far from untypical response, a recent Iranian documentary uploaded to Youtube.com featured a villager accusing the mullahs themselves of being British puppets. Such seemingly extraordianry accusations can only arise because Britain early on sacrificed its moral credibility.

Over the past hundred years, British diplomacy has offered Iranians little reason to reconsider their 1907 conclusion. London has repeatedly conspired to intervene in Persian affairs. Even if Britons forget, Iranians remember full well Foreign Secretary Lord Curzon’s unsuccessful attempt to transform Persia into an veiled protectorate in the aftermath of the First World War and Winston Churchill’s instigating plans for the coup d’état which oustered a democratically elected and highly popular premier, Mohammed Mossadeq, in 1953. In short, subsequent British policies have done little more than cement a reputation for arrogance and duplicity toward a country that had once hoped for very different relations.

It is high time to reconsider this tragic trajectory. A century on, the Anglo-Russian Convention and the subsequent course of British-Iranian relations need to be reappraised. Prime Minister Gordon Brown and a new British government have an opportunity to set a fresh course. Given the mistakes that have flowed so abundantly since 1907, a fresh start that takes account of legitimate Iranian grievance and ambitions ought to be the order of the day. Perhaps the centennial offers Britain a moment to reflect on its long-lost moral authority?

Rod reveals his secret about the upcoming Vancouver show…

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Many of you might not be aware that today is the International Day Of The Disappeared.

What is its significance?

Well, today is a day on which we do our best not to overlook the fact that those that have vanished without a trace did not do so of their volition, that someone, somewhere knows of their fate, and that that fate is usually death or imprisonment. Today is the day that we do our best to remember that those responsible for the disappearance of others must be held accountable for their actions, and that the act itself is not something of the past.

As Amnesty International points out…

“Enforced disappearances are not a thing of the past. They continue all over the world – in Algeria, Colombia, Nepal, the Russian Federation, Sri Lanka, the former Yugoslavia – to name but a few countries. The USA, sometimes acting with the complicity of other governments, has carried out enforced disappearances of terror suspects. Those who commit these crimes have done so with almost complete impunity.

Each enforced disappearance violates a swathe of human rights: the right to security and dignity of person; the right not to be subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment; the right to humane conditions of detention; the right to a legal personality; as well as rights related to fair trial and family life. Ultimately, it can violate the right to life, as victims of enforced disappearance are often killed.”

First, I’ll admit to being a lukewarm hockey fan. I like watching the Canucks play now and then and, of course, am admittedly a playoff bandwagon jumper.

Second, let me state for the record that in the Premier League, kits are usually changed from season to season, which is the reason that I stopped collecting Arsenal kit tops some years ago, having amassed every one of them from the late 70’s until the early part of this decade. I just couldn’t justify buying into the constant ploy of getting supporters to spend even more money than they already do.

That said – I am about to go off regarding the Canucks new uniforms, so if you like them, step away from your computer.

Photo by Rebecca Bollwitt

Let’s start with the basics. Who in the hell chose the entirely unimaginative designers that came up with this thing? You have to wonder if they just set up a giant pin the tail on the donkey jersey and walked blindly towards it.

The jersey is basically nothing more than our original colours from the 70’s with the current logo plastered on the front and, as an added treat, ‘Vancouver’ awkwardly arched over the logo.

You know who had design skills? Joe Borovich.

Borovich, a North Vancouverite, designed our now legendary rink and stick logo, which is actually the letter ‘C’. Believe it or not, it is considered to be one of the best sporting logos of all time, which might be why it’s still so popular.

So one has to ask the obvious question. Why not just go back to using the original uniforms and do away with that atrocious Orca?

Seriously.

Orca? Cool stick design? Lame Orca? Cool stick design?

Hell, even the Millionaires logo was better than that Orca, and it was just crimson letters sewn into a big white ‘V’.

There’s a reason why I respect the New York Yankees. It’s because in almost 100 years they’ve not only kept their uniforms basically the same, but they still adhere to the tradition of not putting the names of players on the back. And guess who still has some of the most purchased merchandise in all of sports?

With regards to hockey, what is the one team logo that stands out above all others? If the famed emblem of the Montreal Canadiens popped into your head, you’d be right. It has, for decades, remained unaltered. In fact, when it comes to this country, it’s almost as internationally recognizable as our flag.

Now, can you imagine what would happen in Montreal were they to change that logo, replacing it with a set of old-world fur traders hoisting a canoe over their heads with one hand whilst giving the thumbs up with the other, their faces adorned with ridiculous cartoon smiles?

Well, if you can imagine thousands of people willingly throwing themselves out of open windows, you might have a decent picture.

Last night, after months of searching and then finally having to special order it, I finally got a copy of Ghosts Of Abu Ghraib. Before commenting, let me first say that this documentary should be shown in every classroom in the United States. I believe it to be that important.

The fact that it was so hard to come by says something. Having gone to numerous ‘mega-stores’ that are home to thousands of DVD titles, both in Canada and the US, I was never able to find it after its release on DVD. It aired on HBO on the 22nd of February of this year, but being that I don’t have a television, I was unable to watch it.

Directed by Rory Kennedy, the daughter of late Senator Robert Kennedy, the documentary examines what occurred at the prison and the fact that while 11 low ranking MP’s and MI Corpsmen were made scapegoats for the abuses that took place there, neither military interrogators, private contractors operating at the prison, nor The Department of Defense were ever singled out for their roles in the abuses.

The premise is very simple, and one that, when confronted by it, will make sense to those who languish under the belief that what occurred was the work of a few ‘troubled’ individuals. That following General Geoffrey D. Miller’s visit to the prison at the behest of the Department of Defense in August of 2003, and his suggestion that ‘Gitmo-iszing’ the approach taken by interrogators there would result in the production of better intelligence, the methods employed were significantly altered.

At the time, approximately 300 US soldiers, most of them with absolutely no experience in detention, were in charge of some 6,000 prisoners. The prison itself operated in two capacities. Many considered to be of low priority were housed outside the prison proper in a makeshift camp surrounded by wire. Those that were considered actionable were held in two tiers of the prison, one for men, the other for women and children.

Women and children were held at the prison as bargaining chips, used by interrogators as a way to threaten those being questioned or entice those that had not been captured to surface. In some cases, male children as young as 9 years old were held in the facility entirely naked.

In the male tier of the prison, nudity became the norm. Prisoners were often held in stress positions for hours on end with women’s underwear placed over their heads, some chained to the metal frames of bed racks, some to the bars of cell doors, others to the bars of cell windows. One of the most important aspects of the documentary is that those MP’s that were assigned to these two tiers were placed under the command of military intelligence, and, as previously stated, had no experience, nor training, regarding detention. Ultimately, they were instructed to help ‘soften up’ those that were to be interrogated, which involved the use of numerous techniques, among them - sexual humiliation, sleep deprivation, sensory deprivation, the employment of extreme, prolonged stress positions, and the threat of the use of unleashing guard dogs. And yet, when the scandal broke, the photographs taken by those individuals were used to seal their fate while those above them, that had encouraged such behaviour, were never held responsible.

There is, of course, no excuse for the actions of those that followed such orders without questioning them, though as numerous personal interviews in the documentary demonstrate, some of those involved did, though typically only in private conversation, usually too afraid to actually address the issue with those who either knew nothing of what was actually transpiring or their immediate superiors.

The fundamental purpose of the film is to demonstrate that what took place at Abu Ghraib was not merely the result of a few ‘bad apples’, as then Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld suggested. But that the United States, following the invasion of Afghanistan, purposely set about challenging the application of the Geneva Conventions and the UN Convention Against Torture with regards to detainees, and how such legal manipulations led to a much wider application of internationally illegal intelligence gathering methods.

As some of you are aware, the worst of what occurred at Abu Ghraib was never widely exposed. While the pictures that surfaced caused outrage around the world, the reality that US personnel had raped a female inmate and made a father and son perform sexual acts on one another was not disclosed until some time afterwards, and then only by a handful of media sources that are by no means considered mainstream.

This documentary is a black hole. It shows what human beings are capable of when placed in a position of having to follow orders, having been inundated by highly disingenuous information regarding those being detained. As is pointed out in the film, the vast majority of those that were at Abu Ghraib had no significant information with regards to the insurgency or other groups.

One of Kennedy’s truly brilliant inclusions in the film is what he uses to bookmark the entire documentary. From the film’s opening…

“In 1961, an experiment was conducted by Dr. Stanly Milgram a psychologist at Yale University. Participants responded to a newspaper advertisement. The purpose of their ‘obedience study” was to observe an individual’s willingness to inflict pain when ordered to do so. The participants did not know that the “victim” was an actor and that the shocks were not real.

Research Subject #2: …who’s going to take responsibility if anything happens to him?

Researcher: I’m going to take responsibility. Please continue.

Victim: [screams off camera]

All of the subjects administered shocks. The majority did so at the maximum level: 450 volts.”

Kennedy returns to footage from the study at the end of the documentary in which the commentator interjects a profound assertion. That if, in a setting such as that, under the guidance of individuals with no real authority, people are willing to complete the test and employ the maximum level of electricity to the victim, then what is the government capable of, being that they possess far greater powers of authoritative persuasion and indoctrination?

Decades after that question was put forth, what occurred at Abu Ghraib serves as an example.

The Current TV interview that Matthew did with Max Lugavere and Jason Silva back in June is now up. You can watch it below. Also don’t for get to check out information on the show’s hosts as well as their Myspace page. If you’d like to comment on the piece, feel free to contact them at feedback@current.tv.
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We here at matthewgood.org like to put our own spin on things, and blog awards are no different. As you’ll find, the highly coveted MaGoggy is only handed out to those select few that can be singled out in a variety of categories unique to the MaGoggy’s as being truly unmatched.

Winner: Daily Kos.

We have no clue what’s going on over there. It’s all just a big mess of orange links, diaries, and adverts.

Winner: Little Green Footballs.

Little Green Footballs is the definitive example of a blog that remains amazingly dedicated to a single topic. In the case of LGF, it’s ‘Islamofascism’.

Winner: Tie - Tony Pierce and Raymi The Minx.

When you pump out as much content as these two do, there is simply no excuse for punishing your readership by making them endure Blogger and HaloScan.

Winner: The Vancouverite.

They love Holt more than you do, hippie.

Hippie?

Winner: The Bingo Blog.

The world of bingo unleashed.

Winner: Babeland.

A waterproof vibrator sale you say?

Winner: Blog Herald.

Because bloggers need to know…about blogging.

Winners: Progressive Bloggers and Blogging Tories.

Just like twister - fun for the whole family.

Winner: The Official Playboy Blog.

You see, you do read it for the articles.

Have you just discovered that you’re the winner of a coveted MaGoggy? Well, make sure to advertise the fact on your website by including the following graphic…

Congratulations to all of our MaGoggy winners and see you all next year!

I came across this on Facebook and thought that I would give it a go. Someone sent me a list of questions that I guess you’re supposed to answer, so here goes…

The perennial 80’s classic Better Off Dead in which a young John Cusack tackles the K12 and wins the heart of a French foreign exchange student.

The last full book I read was Robert Fisk’s The Great War For Civilization, but the most recent was a number of my favourite pages from The Collected Poems of Czeslaw Milosz.

Right now I would have to say it’s South Park. While I’m a fan of numerous animated shows, such as Family Guy, I don’t think anyone pushes the envelope anywhere near as much as Trey Parker and Matt Stone. In fact, Season 10 of the show probably contains some of their best work – the World Of Warcraft episode, for example, or the Season’s opener in which they confront the fact that Isaac Hayes left the show’s cast because he was offended by the now infamous Scientology episode.

The podcast that I did with Jeremy Taggart for Taggart’s Take. And man, when all three episodes air, are we in for it.

The World Of Warcraft episode in the 10th season of South Park.

There are, of course, a lot more questions, but I just became suddenly disinterested in doing this.

President Bush is set to request a further $50 billion dollars for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. If granted, and using my trusty Dashboard calculator – that’s a $50bn supplemental on top of the original $460bn 2008 fiscal defense budget and the $147bn supplemental for the wars that is current pending – that’s a grand total $657 billion dollars for the fiscal year 2008.

Today the President marked the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, saying…

“Hurricane Katrina broke the levees, it broke a lot of hearts, it destroyed buildings, but it didn’t affect the spirit of this community”

He also claimed that ‘better days were ahead’. I would hope so, being that it’s been two years. The government has pledged $114bn to help in ongoing relief and reconstruction efforts. Using my trusty Dashboard calculator, that’s $543 billion dollars less than the fiscal defense budget for a single year – and $83 billion dollars less than the supplementals requested for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Of course, there were those that weren’t too pleased that the President showed up to mark the somber occasion, being that two years after the fact federal efforts to help address the issue have taken a back seat to, for example, lucrative arms agreements with foreign nations.

Hmm, let’s see.

Israel has received a 25% increase in yearly military aid, numerous Middle Eastern nations, all of which are primarily Sunni, are due some $20 billion dollars over the next decade (most of which will be pumped back into the US defense industry – good for business), the US is now funding Sunni insurgent factions in Iraq, gifting them millions of dollars, the Pentagon paid almost a million dollars to ship two 19-cent washers to an Army base in Texas and has spent some $20.5 million over the last six years in fraudulent shipping costs (that’s what we like to refer to as the ‘reallocation of funds’ to programs that are off the books), the US Embassy in Baghdad will come in at a whopping $592 million dollars - and that’s just off the top of my head.

There is, of course, a lot more – aid to Latin American, African, Eastern European, and Asian countries, not to mention aid funneled through the USAID program to a variety of groups in different locales.

It’s a shame that New Orleans isn’t in Israel, in need of an embassy, or, for that matter, a few washers.