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Saturday, Nov 15

Couch Potato Alert:

Mystery!'s second adaptation of a Tony Hillerman novel stars Wes Studi as Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn with Adam Beach as Officer Jim Chee.

Coyote Waits: A Mystery! TV Special

Sunday, November 16 at 9:00 pm EST
Channel 13 NYC

:: SHOW LINK ::
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Saturday, Nov 15

AN AMERICAN FAMILY - The TV Series

The other day I mentioned the Loud Family of California in discussing the video footage of the "Pax" Family of Baghdad. I just wanted to add a bit of information about the Louds for those who missed the original TV series.

It has been described as the original "reality" TV series. A couple of producers named The Raymonds found an uppermiddle class, affluent California family and approached them to be videotaped for a documentary series on PBS-TV (non-commercial TV). The Loud Family agreed to it. When the series started, superficially, they seemed like an ordinary "normal" happy family but...

As time and the series continued, it emerged that the husband engaged in infidelities with other women and one of the sons was a homosexual. By the end of the series, the husband dumped the wife and the son moved to NYC and became a flaming gay guy. And the family seemed to fall apart.

It's an old Viennese axiom that an outsider or third party can never really know what is between a man and a woman or even two men who are a couple because some of it is chemistry. And thus we have these imponderables.

Pat Loud was an attractive woman, who maintained her good grooming, civil manner and thoughtfulness as she aged gracefully. At first glance, one would be hard-pressed to find something objectionable about her. But her husband played around with other women and wanted a divorce from Pat. The burning question was: WHY?

The best the audience could come up with was rather strange: it seemed like Bill Loud may have blamed his wife for Lance's homosexuality.

Lance Loud died in recent years from AIDS, and I believe the Loud Family is somewhat scattered now.

But I looked on the Internet and found some websites on Google that have information about them. I'll leave the link to them on PBS-TV here.

:: An American Family: The Louds ::
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Saturday, Nov 15

TWO ISTANBUL SYNAGOGUES BOMBED

At least 20 people were killed and more than 250 wounded on Saturday when car bombers shattered two Istanbul synagogues as worshippers celebrated the Sabbath.

[The terrorists] ...hit the central Neve Shalom synagogue and another, Beit Israel, in the Sisli district around 9:30 a.m. (0730 GMT). The Neve Shalom -- "Oasis of Peace" -- was especially busy for a bar-mitzvah coming of age ceremony.

Many of the casualties were not Jews but Turkish pedestrians on the busy streets outside the heavily protected synagogues. ...The Anatolian news agency said one Turkish policeman was among the dead.

Turkish Islamist group IBDA/C -- the Islamic Great Eastern Raiders/Front -- claimed responsibility in a call to Turkey's semi-official Anatolian news agency.

Roland Jacquard, head of the International Terrorism Observatory in Paris, said the likeliest suspect was the militant group Ansar al-Islam, which the Pentagon has called the principal "terrorist adversary" of U.S. forces in Iraq.

Jacquard said claims of responsibility should be treated cautiously, but that IBDA/C was very close to Ansar, long based in Iraq's Kurdish areas traditionally hostile to Turkey.

-- From Reuters via My Way
-- via Drudge Report.

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:: Comment :: I've heard on the grapevine that some Kurdish businessmen from the Kurdish Northern area of Iraq have been traveling to Haifa in Israel to see what consumer goods they could buy there to sell in Iraq via their import/export Trading Companies. I understand that Ansar doesn't like this connection and wants to stop it.

I don't know if this issue is connected to these bombings, but, I suppose, it's possible.

According to some people, an overland route for this purpose has been established which traverses Turkish territory. Why go through Turkish territory, rather than Amman? I don't know. These days there are a lot of security concerns. Maybe the security is better on the Turkish route.

Anyway, just something to think about.
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Saturday, Nov 15

Transponders tracking you? . . .

High-tech devices monitor products from manufacturer's headquarters. Wal-Mart and the U.S. Department of Defense have been the biggest boosters of the technology.

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Friday, Nov 14

GOTCHA! -- Steve Martin has agreed to step into
the role of Inspector Jacques Clouseau for MGM's new "Pink Panther" movie.

Yes, more! We need more of this!!

-- From YahooNews > Entertainment from Reuters.

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Friday, Nov 14

A FEW SUNDRY NOTES:

BBC Radio News at 5am EST claimed that Coalition HQ in Basra is in lockdown for 24 hours. Reported by Peter Biles in Baghdad.

Also, I saw on the TV News that General Abizaid is, supposedly, about to pick up from Tampa, Florida, and move to CentCom's forward base in Qatar.

And last, but not least, Riverbend doesn't seem to grasp that this is not conceptualized as an occupation, but rather, as a Reconstruction process.
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Friday, Nov 14

YOU CAN'T SAY THAT! -- A leading Saudi newspaper lashed out at Qatar's widely-watched
Al Jazeera television on Thursday, saying its coverage of this week's suicide bombing in Riyadh was aimed at inciting more violence.

The editorial in Al Riyadh is the latest volley in a diplomatic row between Gulf powerhouse Saudi Arabia and the tiny energy-rich emirate of Qatar which erupted last year over the controversial Al Jazeera and Doha's ties to Israel...

-- Excerpted from an article by Reuters
-- via The Jordan Times.
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Friday, Nov 14

TRACER FIRE LIT UP THE SKY: U.S. forces struck suspected guerrilla targets in Baghdad with mortars, artillery and gunships on Thursday on the second night of a crackdown against anti-American attackers in the Iraqi capital. The sound of explosions and bursts of artillery fire echoed across the city and tracer fire lit up the night sky.

Ground and air units struck locations near Baghdad's international airport to the south of the city, near Abu Ghraib prison on the city's western outskirts and in eastern Baghdad.

"Operation Iron Hammer will continue tonight, tomorrow and in the coming days," said
Captain David Gercken.

-- From Reuters via YahooNews.
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Thursday, Nov 13

WHAT THEY SAID -- **I wish they could run any basic self-defense classes in Iraq, I'm sure many women would sign for them. Just a thought.**

Great idea! from Fayrouz in Dallas.

:: HER BLOG ::

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Thursday, Nove 13

NEW PRESIDENTIAL INSTRUCTIONS: President Bush has said that the Iraqis should be more involved in the governance of their country so that he has instructed Ambassador Bremer to confer with the Governing Council to develop a strategy.

-- From VOA News by Scott Stearns.
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Thursday, Nov 13

AS PER 1511: UN Security Council Resolution 1511, passed last month, called for the 24-member Iraqi Interim Governing Council to present a timeframe by December 15 for the drafting of a constitution and holding of national elections.

The Council is forming a committee to set a timetable by that deadline.

Besides Shadershi and Nureddin the committee will include Jalal Talabani and Massoud Barzani, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, Mohammed Bahr al-Uloom, Adnan Pachachi, Mahmud Othman, Hamid Majid, Ahmed Shayaa al-Barrak, Yonnadam Kanna and Shangul Shapuk.

-- From AFP Mideast via YahooNews.
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Thursday, Nov 13

BAGHDAD RAIDS: AFP is reporting that early Thursday morning, Baghdad local time, hundreds of Iraqi police backed up by US MPs launched a major raid on suspected gangster hideouts in central Baghdad. Fanning out from the Police Academy, they went after thieves, illegal money exchanger dealers, and others, according to Deputy Interior Minister Ahmad Kazem Ibrahim.

-- From AFP Mideast via YahooNews.
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Thursday, Nov 13

And in Real Life News . . .

BLOGGER GONE MIA: One of our Baghdad bloggers has gone missing. Electricity has been very erratic in Baghdad for the last couple of days. And then Blogger was down during our overnight for routine maintenance.

But before The Messopotamian left, he did a smart thing just as a precaution: he gave the keys to his blog to another (backup) person named Lee.

People are worried about him. Yes, this is a weird situation. Yes, these folks in Baghdad are real. Sometimes we can help them, but sometimes we can't. Sometimes we want very much to be able to reach out and rescue them, but sometimes we cannot do much to impact the situation at such a long distance. It can be painful and frustrating.

Meanwhile, say a little prayer for him, O.K.?

Thank you.

:: UPDATE :: Thank God, the blogger seems to be back.

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Here in the Northeastern US, we are experiencing very high winds, so our electricity may be a bit iffy this afternoon. Hang on to your wig and keys! --as one popular TV host puts it.

Stranger still, I saw on the Noonday News a bit of video in which a neighborhood in greater Los Angeles had several inches of hail!

And that's your "Hey, Martha" for today :-)

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Thursday, Nov 13

A DURST BURST by Cindy Adams . . .

**ROBERT DURST is cranky. The man who wore a dress, the millionaire who stole a sandwich, a New York real-estate scion who lived in a $300-a-month Galveston flat, the husband whose first wife disappeared, the friend whose pal got shot dead, has stunned everyone - found not guilty of murder in a gruesome Texas trial where he admitted hacking up a body...**

-- From the NY Post

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Also this angle:

**Robert Durst's verdict seemed to fuel the fears of people who know him, including his brothers and the woman he was dating in 1982 when his first wife mysteriously vanished.**

-- From the NY Times - Reg Re'qd.
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Wed-Thurs Overnight, Nov 13

Demons control my pipelines and
are making me perform lewd acts . . .

A couple of days ago, Prof Juan Cole caught up with this overwrought essay which had been originally published in October.


In laying out the Figure in the Carpet for us,
Delinda C. Hanley alleges that the MEMRI organization has opened a secret, heavily guarded office in Baghdad on Abu Nawaas Street to spy on Iraqis, make them look bad, and ultimately take over control of them.

Then they will buy up all the Iraqis' homes and throw them out on the street and out of Iraq. Why? Perhaps because this, in fact, is what some Iraqis did to the Jews who once lived there.

But Hanley never mentions that Jews once lived in Baghdad and may, in fact, still have title or deeds to property there.

Baghdad University professor Dr. Anwar Abdul Aziz says in this article that MEMRI and its offshoots have sinister purposes. [How would he know? He's been living inside a belljar for the last couple of decades.]

"Who would have imagined that Baghdad would someday host a center serving Israeli plots and schemes?" asked Dr. Soad Bahudin al-Mousli of Al-Rafeden University. [Yeah, right, especially since Jews lived in Baghdad for so many hundreds of years until just recently.]

Does MEMRI actually have an office in Baghdad? So what if it does? The Roman Catholic Vatican also probably maintains an Office of the Holy See in Baghdad.

What is important here in reading the Hanley essay is not to simply react to it, but instead, try to analyze what it means. What is the bogeyman? What does it imply? What are they afraid of? Having been isolated inside a totalitarian system for the last few decades, the Iraqi people don't have any way yet of knowing what's going on.

It is also cogent to point out that a couple of Israeli newspapers are cited by the author, as well as a hyperlink to MEMRI. In contrast, until recently, the Iraqis were blocked off from accessing any of those sources. Since then, they have shown a healthy curiosity about MEMRI and other such things. They have a lot to catch up on.

-- LINK to Hanley report
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Wednesday, Nov 12

COALITION HITS GORILLAS: After nightfall in Baghdad, forces from the 1st Armored Division attacked a warehouse used by insurgents, setting off explosions that reverberated through the capital.

"The facility is a known meeting, planning, storage and rendezvous point for belligerent elements currently conducting attacks on coalition forces and infrastructure," the Pentagon said.

The mission was part of "Operation Iron Hammer," a new "get tough" policy for confronting insurgents.

-- From an article by Slobodan Lekic
-- for AP via YahooNews.
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Wednesday, Nov 12

MEDIA MATTERS . . .

Office of Strategic Communications: The NY Observer is hopping today! A couple of compelling articles there to those with an interest in media coverage of the Iraqi Project (currently in Reconstruction) and the rest of the fallout from 9/11.

:: Point: "People joke that it’s just like the old days," one Baghdad-based reporter said. He was alluding to Baghdad Bob. "...it makes me sick that my own government is doing it now."

:: Counterpoint: A Washinton Post reporter there said the CPA was in a tough position. "They’re trying to do civil reconstruction of a country in the midst of a very intense conflict."

-- From Green Zone Blues by Sridhar Pappu

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The CPA's New PA System: The Coalition Provisional Authority running Iraq, dissatisfied with the American television news decisions on covering the conflict, is about to create its own broadcast operation, with the capacity to bypass the networks, live from Iraq, 24 hours a day.

It is being described as C-SPAN BAGHDAD. This project is expected to roll out in the next couple of weeks. So far, it still has no official name but it is being compared to the Centcom broadcasts during the military operations last spring.

--From an article by Joe Hagan.
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Wednesday, Nov 12

THE IRAQ STORY NOT SELLING MUCH: Booksellers believe Jessica Lynch's biography, published Tuesday by Alfred A. Knopf and written by Rick Bragg, will do fine. She remains the most famous soldier to emerge from the war. But other books about Iraq have not sold well. For example, "21 Days to Baghdad," by the editors of Time magazine has sold in very small numbers.

-- By Hillel Italie for AP via WINS1010.
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Tuesday, Nov 11

PAX VIDEO UPDATE: Let's not quibble about how Fellini-esque it may or may not be... I watched it twice only because I had to pull up my system volume to hear anything on it. I keep my system volume pretty low because *I'm saving my hearing for Bach.*

The new thing is that the BBC has graciously extracted Salam's segment for your viewing convenience. No more first sitting through 18 minutes of who cares about their politics as I had to. Seems like someone up there is industriously earning his/her salary with their trusty tape editor.

But now that the Beeb has repackaged it, we have uncovered a curious fact, like the dog that did not bark during the night, watson. The name of the moderator of this show is, improbably, Jeremy Paxman. Well, what's this all about? Coincidence or conspiracy? We report, you decide.

And, speaking of conspiracies, I'm working on one now. Yesterday, Prof Juan Cole, who seems to get a little light in his loafers once in a while, had a very bad hair day. But more of this anon... I hope to get to it later. Gotta go. Toodles for now.

-- PAX REPACKAGED.
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Tuesday, Nov 11

MEDICAL DEATH-MOBILE: In Baghdad, Iraqi police stopped an ambulance driving around central Baghdad and discovered that it was wired with 1,000 pounds of explosives, said district police commander Maj. Hakim Razak Kadim. The occupants of the vehicle fled after police stopped it Monday night.

The vehicle had four artillery shells stuffed with plastic explosives, crates of plastic explosives and cylanders packed with other explosives, said Col. Kurt Fuller of the 82nd Airborne Division. The damage the makeshift bomb would have done "would have completely destroyed a building. It's a huge bomb," Fuller said.

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There have been a series of strong explosions heard in central Baghdad after 9:30 pm their time. Following one of them, white smoke could be seen rising from the Green Zone. Police have set up check points in the vicinity.

-- From an article by Bassem Mroue
-- at YahooNews > Middle East > AP.
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Tuesday, Nov 11

SADR DISTRICT OFFICIAL KA'ABI:

Army and Iraquis Disagree on What Happened

Anthony Shadid tries to investigate and sort out the tragic circumstances of the Sadr District Council Official's death, apparently due to a misunderstanding of some sort.

"We're concerned about how the good people of Iraq view this. We're concerned about how people might turn this in ways that should not be done," said Col. William Bishop, a civil affairs officer who works with the 41-member council in Sadr City and eight others in Baghdad. "It's a sad event and a good man died, and I'm still not sure exactly what happened."

Mr. Ka'abi was a 28-year-old mechanical engineer who led the council for more than three months.

At least 200 of his neighbors joined his (traditional) funeral procession, during which he was honored as a good man and a martyr, who died while trying to make his neighborhood better.

-- From the Washington Post.
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Tuesday, Nov 11

MORE HEAT OR LIGHT: The BBC has created a new senior editorial post to advise on its Middle East coverage, as the corporation continues to come under fire for alleged anti-Israeli bias. The Guardian refers to this post in its headline as a "Middle East tsar," which is not the same thing as an ombudsman. As a tsar he can serve as a mere repository or convenient wastebasket for the company to dump consumer complaints into.

The new official is identified as Malcom Balen. The article does not divulge how his Global Belief System differs from that of the BBC on the points that were criticized in this article or how his Master Narrative would differ from that of the organization.

"The BBC's mental assumptions... that American power is a bad thing, whereas the UN is good, that the Palestinians are in the right and Israel isn't, that the war in Iraq was wrong, that the European Union is a good thing and that people who criticise it are xenophobic." [from The Daily Telegraph's accusations.]

-- From a Special Report

-- by Ciar Byrne at The Guardian.
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Mon-Tues Overnight, Nov 11

PAX IN MOTION: It seems like the "Pax" family of Baghdad is turning into an Iraqi version of the Loud family of Santa Barbara. While there were a few nice scenic shots of greater Baghdad, there was also a "gettting to know them" process with the Loud's Middle East counterparts. But do you really? Want to get to know them? Salam takes us along on a liquor-buying junket, which could get him and his pals whacked if the wrong crowd ever finds out about it. California, this isn't.

The Salam Pax segment of Newsnight starts about 19 minutes into the tape.

-- SALAM PAX VIDEO ON BBC NEWSNIGHT.
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Monday, Nov 10

ROSIE VS PUBLISHER Continued... The chief financial officer of Gruner+Jahr USA, publisher of Rosie O'Donnell's magazine, admitted Monday that his company reported false circulation figures to hide the magazine's losses.

The bogus numbers were reported to the Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC), whose information is used to help determine ad rates.

Diamond and an ABC official explained that while "Rosie" charged advertisers on the basis of a circulation of 3.5 million per month, its actual subscription and newsstand sales usually fell short of that number.

:: From Radio 1010WINS ::
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Monday, Nov 10

FILM AT 11 - It's really happening now. Salam Pax is doing the moving pictures thing. All is revealed in The UK Guardian today. His recent mysterious hiatus, his further adventures, women luring him into their bedrooms-- oops, maybe I shouldn't have disclosed that part.

Here's to you, Mrs. Robinson ;-)

:: PAX TV at The Guardian ::

Be back later. Probably this evening. God-willing.
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Sun-Mon Overnight, Nov 10

Moslem Kamikaze Alarm Posted:


*To all coasts cells 50, 55, 55, the

water, the water, the water

The goal open, they rely on Allah.*


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::NB: The cry *I rely on Allah* or *we rely on Allah* has been associated with Moslem Kamikaze operations at times in the past.


This message was posted at:

:: Northeast Intelligence Network ::
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Sun-Mon Overnight, Nov 10

IRAQ UPDATE: Aljazeera TV Net reports on Monday, 10 Nov, at 9 GMT, that two powerful explosions were heard in Baghdad late on Sunday, but it remains unclear where the blasts originated.

About 35 men were rounded up over the weekend by US forces in a raid on Baghdad's ritzy Mansur District. The detainees were described as a collection of financiers, weapon makers and commanders of guerrilla-style cells who were planning major attacks on occupation forces.

In northern Iraq, US forces detained a tribal chief for allegedly hosting a former prominent member of the Saddam Hussein regime, police and relatives reported.

:: Aljazeera TV Net ::

Sunday, Nov 9

OVERNIGHT IRAQ VIOLENCE: Aljazeera TV Net is reporting this morning, Sunday, at 10:20 GMT timestamped, that two explosions have occurred in Baghdad during Saturday night and a third set fire to an northern oil pipeline. [Sometimes, no matter how hard I try, I am unable to sort out the times of these events or, sometimes, collate details, etc.]

First, there was an attack on a US military convoy reported in the Zayouna District in central Baghdad with possibly one soldier injured.

Second, in a separate attack, a rocket was fired at a target purportedly close to coalition HQ.

Third, an explosive device was detonated at an oil pipeline in the Hatra area, south of Mosul Province, which left the pipeline ablaze.

:: From an article at Aljazeera TV Net.

Sat-Sun Overnight, Nov 9

Adnan Pachachi Erupts!

~~~ Who's a Puppet???

On Saturday afternoon at 1pm EST on the East Coast of USA, the BBC conducted an unusual Global Call-in Program in conjunction with the American public radio station WNYC. Robin Lustig was the British moderator with Brian Lehrer representing the Yanks. It was part of the Talking Points series and was being called "The World Speaks."

During this program there were a number of live guests. Adnan Pachachi, former Foreign Minister of Iraq, was among them. One of the callers who commented to him, more as an insult than a question, denigrated the Interim Council members' situation and said, in effect, that the Americans had put these people there and that they were just there to do the American bidding, a sort of rubber stamp.

Mr. Pachachi became quite incensed at these remarks and vehemently insisted that the Americans had not put them there and they were not anyone's puppets.

Pachachi then patiently explained that they had convened themselves in response to a United Nations requirement that the Iraqis should form an interim transitional government. He also gave the specific NUMBER of that UN regulation, but, alas, I wasn't quick enough to jot it down, which I regret. Perhaps it will appear in some transcript of the show.

I believe that a certain Young Miss Riverbend referred to the Interim Council members as "the puppets." So, perhaps, she was mistaken and, perhaps, she owes Mr. Pachachi an apology.

Here are the links to this special joint program:

:: BBC Talking Points Special

:: WNYC in London ::

Sat-Sun Overnight, Nov 9

Don't Ask, Don't Tell: **Today the Mail reproduces a statement issued by the office of the future King in which he says "the speculation must be brought to an end."

Speculation over the death of Princess Diana, the Queen Mum’s underground gin canals and what he sees in Camilla are for other times, because for now Charles wants us to hear that allegations concerning him and a staff member are false...

That is a categorical denial. But for good measure the Express... wants us to know some background...

And just in case anyone thinks George developed such stress-induced illnesses from working with a man who talks to his plants, Charles says they were a result of George’s active service in the Falklands.

With that cleared up, we can move on. And ask Charles why he thinks Prince Harry has got red hair and wants to join the Army...**

:: Comment: Did you hear about this? My lips are sealed! But I have wondered for a long time why Harry has red hair...

:: From the ANORAK: Tabs ::