micah holmquist's irregular thoughts and links

Welcome to the musings and notes of a Cadillac, Michigan based writer named Micah Holmquist, who is bothered by his own sarcasm.

Please send him email at micahth@chartermi.net.

Holmquist's full archives are listed here.

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Sites Holmquist trys, and often fails, to go no more than a couple of days without visiting (some of which Holmquist regularly swipes links from without attribution)

Aljazeera.Net English
AlterNet (War on Iraq)
Alternative Press Review
Always Low Prices -- Always
Another Irani online
antiwar.com (blog)
Asia Times Online
Axis of Logic
Baghdad Burning (riverbend)
BBC News
blogdex.net ("track this weblog")
bobanddavid.com
BuzzFlash
The Christian Science Monitor (Daily Update)
Common Dreams
Cryptome
Cursor
Daily Rotten
DefenseLINK
Democracy Now
The Drudge Report
Eat the Press (Harry Shearer, The Huffington Post)
Empire Notes (Rahul Mahajan)
frontpagemag.com (HorowitzWatch)
globalsecurity.org
greenandwhite.com
Guardian Unlimited
Haaretz
The Independent
Information Clearing House
Informed Comment (Juan Cole)
Iranians for Peace

Iraq Dispatches (Dahr Jamail)
Iraqi Democrats Against Occupation
Iraq Occupation and Resistance Report (Psychoanalysts for Peace and Justice)
MetaFilter
MLive
Mr. Show and Other Comedy
The Narco News Bulletin (blog)
NEWSMAKINGNEWS
The New York Times
Occupation Watch
Political Theory Daily Review
Press Action
Project Syndicate
Raed in the Middle (Raed Jarrar)
random-abstract.com
Reuters
Salon
The Simpsons Archive
Simpsons Collector Sector
Slate
Sploid
Technorati ("search for mth.blogspot.com")
thi3rdeye
United States Central Command
U.S. Embassy Baghdad, Iraq
venezuelanalysis.com
War Report (Project on Defense Alternatives)
The Washington Post
Wildfire (Jo Wilding)
wood s lot
www.mnftiu.cc (David Rees)

Blogs that for one reason or another Holmquist would like to read on at least something of a regular basis (always in development)

Thivai Abhor
As'ad AbuKhalil
Ken Adrian
Christopher Allbritton
Alli
Douglas Anders
Mark W. Anderson
Aziz Ansari
Atomic Archive
Bagatellen
James Benjamin
Elton Beard
Charlie Bertsch
alister black
Blame India Watch
Blixa
Blog Left: Critical Interventions Warblog / war blog
Igor Boog
Martin Butler
Chris Campbell
James M. Capozzola
Avedon Carol
Elaine Cassel
cats blog
Jeff Chang
Margaret Cho
Citizens Of Upright Moral Character
Louis CK
Les Dabney
Dack
Natalie Davis
Scoobie Davis
The Day Job
Jodi Dean
Dominic Duval
Steve Earle
Eli
Daniel Ellsberg
Tom Engelhardt
Lisa English
Faramin
Barbara Flaska
Brian Flemming
Joe Foster
Yoshie Furuhashi
Al Giordano
Glovefox
Rob Goodspeed
Grand Puba
Guardian Unlimited Weblog
Pete Guither
The Hairy Eyeball
Ray Hanania
Mark Hand
harveypekar.com
Hector Rottweiller Jr's Web Log Jim Henley Arvin Hill Hit & Run (Reason) Hugo Clark Humphrey Indri The Iraqi Agora Dru Oja Jay Jeff Lynne d Johnson Dallas Jones Julia Kane Blues Benjamin Kepple Ken Layne Phil Leggiere Brian Linse Adam Magazine Majority Report Radio Marc Maron Josh Marshall Jeralyn Merritt J.R. Mooneyham Michael Scott Moore Bob Morris Bob Mould Mr. Show and Tell Muslims For Nader/Camejo David Neiwert NewPages Weblog Aimee Nezhukumatathil Sean O'Brien Patton Oswalt The Panda's Thumb Randy Paul Rodger A. Payne Ian Penman politx Neal Pollack Greg Proops Pro-War.com Pure Polemics Seyed Razavi Rayne Simon Reynolds richardpryor.com Clay Richards Mike Rogers Yuval Rubinstein
Steven Rubio
Saragon Noah Shachtman Court Schuett The Simpsons Archive Amardeep Singh Sam Smith Soundbitten Jack Sparks Ian Spiers Morgan Spurlock Stand Down: The Left-Right Blog Opposing an Invasion of Iraq Aaron Stark Morgaine Swann Tapped (The American Prospect) tex Matthew Tobey Annie Tomlin Tom Tomorrow The University Without Condition Jesse Walker Warblogger Watch Diane Warth The Watchful Babbler The Weblog we have brains Matt Welch
Alex Whalen
Jon Wiener
Lizz Winstead
James Wolcott
Wooster Collective
Mickey Z

Saturday, June 28, 2003
 
A solution that could have been, and perhaps still could be

Remember the suspected bioweapons lab trailers that were found in Iraq about a month ago? You know the ones that went from being a weapon of mass destruction to not being a weapon of mass destruction in a period of no more than seven days and which reportedly are believed by British intelligence to have been used for artillery balloons. The latest word, as reported by the AP, is that the Central Intelligence Agency is sticking by its finding that the trailers were likely part of a bioweapons lab, despite a State Department claim to the contrary.

The CIA's view seems to be the most popular in the White House. "The President believes that they [the CIA], in this instance, have the best judgment because they were in the most authoritative position to have accurate information," White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said on Thursday. "It's not only the President who thinks that, but so, too, does the Secretary of State."

This may be true and, for the sake of making a cheap semi-humorous political point, I will assume it is. I now plan to doubt just about everything that comes out of the State Department.

***

Speaking of the State Department, I was surfing their webpage for things to not believe when I came across this interview that Secretary of State Colin Powell gave for All Things Considered yesterday. In it we find out that those under Powell call him "Boss" as if he were Alan Lomax or something. Also in the interview, Powell says, "The imminent threat is that suddenly, this biological warfare lab, for example, could have been put into use. And the possibility that anything that came out of that lab or any of the chemical capability he had could have been given to terrorist organizations. And the point well, should we wait until we see a chemical device exploded or turned loose or some toxin released in London or Paris or Frankfurt or New York or Los Angeles and then decide we have an imminent threat?" This nothing but outright poppycock as 1) Powell is connected with the State Department, who we all know can't be trusted; 2) A long trail of info suggests that other members of the Bush Administration were saying that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction; 3) Powell has said Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. For instance on March 24, he said that Operation Iraqi Freedom " is part of this great effort to rid Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction and provide a better life for the Iraqi people by getting rid of this regime."

***

CNN has not one but two interesting stories about WMD programs that may have existed in Iraq. This AP story on the same topic is also worth reading.

***

"The U.S. military is investigating the deaths of two soldiers whose bodies were found Saturday 20 miles northwest of Baghdad," FOX News writes today. "63 [U.S.] troops have died since the war ended May 1. The military has confirmed 138 deaths prior to that date, while the names of several other casualties have not yet been made available."

Despite these deaths, yesterday Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld reportedly denied that the U.S. was facing a guerrilla war in Iraq and instead blamed criminal elements in Iraq. While this might not be completely inaccurate, it does seem a bit much considering that few, if any, of the attacks on coalition troops have involved any other criminal activities such as robberies. The Iraqi criminal element almost certainly wouldn't be satisfied with just attacking the forces of occupation for the sake of such attacks, and so it seems safe to conclude that some other forces are involved.

Yesterday a CNN story about another attack that happened in Baghdad had this info:

"There is no doubt this was an organized attack, an ambush, and it represents an increasing level of organization and sophistication. What we're seeing is an urban guerilla force taking the initiative against the forces that are there," said a U.S. military official familiar with the latest briefings on the security situation in Iraq.

"We are seeing the elements getting traction, probing, finding a vulnerability, and there is no coercive apparatus to punish them, so we can expect ... more of this stuff. We don't have the secret police-type there to root out that insurgent force and never will, so we are at a disadvantage," he said.

***

"Syria says it has protested to the US Government over an American military strike thought to have been aimed at Saddam Hussein," the BBC reported three days ago. "The comment, made in the official Syrian Arab News Agency on Wednesday - nearly a week after the event occurred - was the first from Damascus. The Foreign Ministry said it had summoned the US ambassador to Damascus, Theodore Kattouf, to protest and demand the return of five Syrian soldiers wounded in the incident."

***

Has Bush forgotten?

***

The U.S. wouldn't be having any of these problems if around March 19 President George W. Bush had said, "Fuck Iraq! Let's show them a little American Know How and show the Japs they got off easy" before launching attacks designed to kill every person in Iraq.