I give the above numbers to argue my point only about the threat of “small little rockets” and not out of callousness to the far worse damages done by Israel’s war in response. No Hezbollah’s rockets are not an existential threat, but a considerable one. How much greater could Iran’s threat be?

In other words, Hezbollah is no threat to Israel except for it’s connection to Iran. A good thought experiment would be on goals and possible activities of a Hezbollah without Iranian support. I bet they would be pretty much the same as they are now but the means might be more crude.

Nevermind that Israel cannot use it’s nuclear power to destroy Hezbollah ( or Iran). Nevermind that the “small little rockets” terrorize and kill coming by the hundreds and thousands and that some of them are not so small.

I have noticed previously and here again that Juan Cole has little to no sympathy or understanding of Israel in his opinions. I read his blog every day in the early part of the Iraq War until he disappointed me when he ventured off into the Israeli/ Palestinian conflict. I expect historians to be more fair and neutral.

It seems he posted a story that Isreal had killed several civillians in a bombing raid. They then bombed the funeral as well. Something that Saddam was known to do.

This never happened it was briefly reported by Reuters but then was almost immediately retracted. Cole left the story up on his sight,even though he was emailed at least 2 times. Both times he was informed that the story was not true and all news services had retracted it.

Now the problem with this explanation is that it isn’t really competing since single-answerism of the kind this show exhibited was more about root cause or main cause and probably could embrace all these other factors and more…

The Bush Agenda and Iraq

It’s been over 3 years since the war started in Iraq, but the reasons for the conflict are still in dispute. Is there hope for democracy and freedom? Is it about oil? Is it about corporate profits and U.S. imperialism?

Guests:

Antonia Juhasz is a leading expert on international trade and finance policy. She worked as a congressional aide and as project director of the International Forum on Globalization. Currently, she is a visiting scholar with the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington DC. In addition to numerous TV and radio appearances, her writing has appeared in dozens of publications including the Los Angeles Times and the Miami Herald. Her most recent book is The Bush Agenda: Invading the World, One Economy at a Time.

It was the first hour of Friday’s KUOW’s Weekday http://www.kuow.org/programs/weekday.asp (August 11th, 2006)

It’s an archived stream, and it podcasts.

Regardless, yes, the state sponsered papers tote the state line, but they don’t tend to sell a lot…

Joshua, thank you.

Well the answer would be obvious if you read the news paper headlines recently. US is waiting on the sidelines on the pretext of getting hezbollah cleaned up and then be interested in lucrative reconstruction and army supplies and training contracts. Who benefits from these transactions? Obviously the US, from additional sales of arms and equipment and the so called “training of the lebanese army” Take a look at the the following stocks and track their progress from 2003 (the start of the Iraq war) BA, LHM, GD, RTN. All of them have been on an upswing climb.

So I guess the foreign policy and general strategy is that as long there are parts of the world that is kept unstable for vested reasons and the wars are fought outside the borders of the US, all that matters is how the internal economy is doing. Even if that is at the cost of tens of thousands of civilian lives taken elsewhere.

But that is a blood stained economic growth don’t you think?

Nasrallah today gave a speech asking Israeli Arabs to leave Haifa so that he can kill the non Muslims left in the city.

So far the Arabs in Haifa said that they would not leave.

I hope they don’t leave but if they do leave it will be a repeat of 1948 and I am sure the Israelis won’t let them back in since they will be participating in genocide.

Here is what Israeli Arab response:

“Haifa’s Arabs: We won’t leave city

Former MK Issam Mahoul rejects Nasrallah’s call to Haifa’s Arab population to evacuate city; ‘We have nothing to do outside of Haifa, and we refuse to be refugees,’ Mahoul asserts. Haifa Mayor: Nasrallah won’t succeed in uprooting Arab residents

Ahiya Raved

Former Knesset Member and Haifa resident Issam Mahoul on Wednesday categorically rejected Hizbullah chief Hassan Nasrallah’s call to Arab residents of Haifa to evacuate the city.

“We have nothing to do outside of Haifa, and we have no reason to panic. The Palestinian people are especially unwilling to be refugees of any kind again,” Mahoul told Ynet.

In response to the National Security Cabinet’s approval of a widened offensive in south Lebanon, Nasrallah addressed Israel in a recorded speech broadcast on al-Manar Wednesday night. “Thousands of intrepid fighters await you, and we’ll kick you out by force,” Nasrallah threatened.”

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3289009,00.html

Oil = money.

Period.

After money, you can go anywhere with the equation, do anything you like with progressive or regressive consequences. But considering the nature of capitalism, greed, and ignorance, once you’ve reached the money part of the equation, you’ve already hit the practical dead end.

Money, the ultimate illusion, is the end unto itself.