Barack Obama's $1.3 billion dollars worth of colonialism: Why the US and Jimmy Carter want Egypt's military budget to remain secret

The people of Egypt are beginning to say, through their elected representatives, how they would like their foreign policy to be run. The Associated Press reports:

Egypt’s Islamist-dominated parliament unanimously voted on Monday in support of expelling Israel’s ambassador in Cairo and halting gas exports to the Jewish state.
...
The vote was taken by a show of hands on a report by the chamber’s Arab affairs committee that declared Egypt will “never” be a friend, partner or ally of Israel. The report described Israel as the nation’s “number one enemy” and endorsed what it called Palestinian resistance “in all its kinds and forms” against Israel’s “aggressive policies.”
...
The parliamentary report also called for the recall of Egypt’s ambassador in Israel and a revision of Egypt’s nuclear power policy in view of the widespread suspicion that Israel has a nuclear arsenal of its own.

“Revolutionary Egypt will never be a friend, partner or ally of the Zionist entity (Israel), which we consider to be the number one enemy of Egypt and the Arab nation,” said the report. “It will deal with that entity as an enemy, and the Egyptian government is hereby called upon to review all its relations and accords with that enemy.”

Monday’s vote by parliament could serve as an indication of what may lie ahead.

But the Post reassures us that Egypt's Parliament does not set foreign policy in Egypt, the pro-US dictatorship retains that power.

The motion is largely symbolic, because only the ruling military council can make such decisions, and it is not likely to impact Egypt’s relations with Israel.

A recent poll of Arab populations in Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Jordan, Palestine, Lebanon, Sudan, Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco and Mauritania (not yet fully released in English) show that the Egyptian people are not alone in their opposition to the policies of the US colonies of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, UAE, Kuwait, Egypt and others.

• Contrary to mainstream global media coverage, 73 per cent of those polled see Israel and the US as the two most threatening countries. Five per cent see Iran as the most threatening, a percentage that varies between countries and regions.


• A high 84 per cent believe the Palestinian question is the cause of all Arabs and not the Palestinians only.


• A high 84 per cent reject the notion of their state's recognition of Israel and only 21 per cent support, to a certain degree, the peace agreement signed between Egypt, Jordan and the PLO with Israel. Less than a third agree with their government's foreign policy.


• When it comes to WMD, 55 per cent support a region free of nuclear weapons and 55 per cent see Israel's possession of nuclear weapons as justifying their possession by other countries in the region.

We've seen many times on this blog the military dictatorship's commitment to Western news organizations that it intends to prevent Egypt's citizens from controlling foreign policy.

The new majority is likely to increase the difficulty of sustaining the United States’ close military and political partnership with post-Mubarak Egypt, though the military has said it plans to maintain a monopoly over many aspects of foreign affairs.

We've also seen Jimmy Carter publicly expressing support for that type of arrangement.

" 'Full civilian control' is a little excessive, I think"

also

"I don’t think it is going to be detrimental for the military to retain some special status."

and

“If the civilian leadership decided to give the SCAF immunity from prosecution, say, for the death of the people in Tahrir Square over the last few months, I would have no objection to that,” Mr. Carter said. Protecting the military budget from full civilian scrutiny might be another point where civilian political leaders could compromise, he said.

Let's look at that last part more closely. "Protecting the military budget from full civilian scrutiny might be another point where civilian political leaders could compromise, he said."

Parliament's recent vote makes it more clear than ever that what the Obama administration is buying for $1.3 billion per year is policies that are in line with Obama's values, perceptions and sensibilities rather than those of the people of Egypt.

A foreign government that multiple polls show most Arab people consider one of the two biggest threats to them contributes 1.3 billion dollars a year to Egypt's military. The representatives of the Egyptian people are not to even see how this money is disbursed. Details of the financial relationship between the United States and Egypt are kept secret from the Egyptian people. Jimmy Carter has expressed no objection to that, at least for the foreseeable future.

The demand that the military budget not be under civilian oversight is crucial for maintaining the type of semi-colonial status the US hopes to retain if Egypt attains a democratic facade, and the modern way to implement Great Britain's classic colonialist effort to in 1922 to cede sovereignty to an Egyptian government but only over policy areas Britain was not concerned with. This is the single policy issue most important to look at to gauge Egypt's progress toward independence from the United States.

Rather than support a foreign-sponsored effort to impose a civil war on Syria that could not remove Assad without killing tens if not hundreds of thousands of people at the very least, if Obama favored democracy he could simply inform the pro-US colonial dictatorship of Egypt that the US is no longer willing to pay it to oppose the policy preferences of its own people. Then he could do that for other pro-US dictatorships where the US has tremendous enough leverage to force them to pursue policies supported by fewer than a third of their people.

But Obama opposes democracy. Instead he commits to do whatever it takes to maintain Israel's regional advantage over any potential adversaries. Whatever it takes means Saudi Arabia, which outspends Israel 2.5 to 1 on military expenditures must remain under the control of a pro-US dictatorship rather than risk being influenced any group of voters in that country. It means the misery the US has recently imposed on Iraq should, if Obama is able, be extended to Syria and eventually even to Iran if the US could do so with little enough consequence.

On this issue of democratic oversight of the military budget, we will see if the people of Egypt are able to overcome Barack Obama's efforts to limit their sovereignty and hold the 85 million people of Egypt, on behalf of fewer than 6 million Jewish people in Israel, in a state of colonial subordination.

I'm actually optimistic that Egypt will break free, and while I hope as soon as June this year Egypt will be able to make foreign policy that reflects the views, sensibilities and perceptions of their people, I am even more optimistic that the US control of Egypt is disintegrating and even if it is not gone this year, like US control of Iraq, it will not be able to survive one or two electoral cycles. I believe that in the long term and even the medium term, US control of Egypt is over.

Unfortunately Barack Obama and the US' hold over the other colonies in the region: Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Kuwait, UAE and others has not visibly begun to break. Hopefully we will see that next.

Iran's real position on Israel

Supporters of Israel will not agree with Iran's position, but we'll remember Daniel Davies' observation that "good ideas do not need lots of lies told about them in order to gain public acceptance."

The idea that Iran intends or has threatened to attack Israel with nuclear weapons is just a lie. Netanyahu deliberately tells this lie because without these lies, his position, support for Zionism against the wishes of the people of the region, is incompatible with Western values.

But here are Khamenei's words. I highly recommend reading the speech in full.

The solution of the Islamic Republic to the issue of Palestine and this old wound is a clear and logical proposal that is based on political wisdom accepted by global public opinion and it has been presented in detail previously. We neither propose a classic war by the armies of Islamic countries, nor do we propose throwing Jewish immigrants into the sea or arbitration of the United Nations and other international organizations. We propose a referendum among the Palestinian people.

Just like any other nation, the Palestinian nation has the right to determine its own destiny and to elect its own government. All the original people of Palestine - including Muslims, Christians and Jews and not foreign immigrants - should take part in a general and orderly referendum and determine the future government of Palestine whether they live inside Palestine or in camps or in any other place.

White South Africans accepted majority Black rule because the long term trend turned against them. Long before Black people were able to effectively impose their will on White South Africans by force, that being a potential eventuality led White South Africans to reach an accommodation that ended their enforced political majority.

If the people of the Middle East, in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Kuwait, UAE, Egypt and other current governments ruled effectively as colonies by pro-US dictators gain the accountability over their governments' policies, then Jewish people in Israel will accept non-Jewish rule for the same reasons.

The people of Palestine, if negotiations for a transition begin when the threat is still potential as they did in South Africa, would be flexible as Black South Africans were about the rights of what Khamenei calls "foreign immigrants".

The alternative is colonialism. When Barack Obama says the United States "will do what it takes to preserve Israel's qualitative military edge because Israel must always have the ability to defend itself, by itself, against any threat", he is saying he will do all he can to ensure that the 400 million non-Jews of Israel's region remain either under sanction, foreign-supported civil war or direct pro-US dictatorial rule indefinitely for the sake of fewer than six million Jewish people in that territory. A Black-skinned Cecil Rhodes and a true embarrassment to the human race.

What is sacrosanct for the United States: Israel or Democracy?

A quick look at two contradictory passages from Barack Obama's speech to AIPAC:

In many ways, this award is a symbol of the broader ties that bind our nations. The United States and Israel share interests, but we also share those human values that Shimon spoke about: a commitment to human dignity. A belief that freedom is a right that is given to all of God's children. An experience that shows us that democracy is the one and only form of government that can truly respond to the aspirations of citizens.

and

Four years ago, I stood before you and said that, "Israel's security is sacrosanct. It is non-negotiable." That belief has guided my actions as president. The fact is my administration's commitment to Israel's security has been unprecedented. Our military and intelligence cooperation has never been closer. Our joint exercises and training have never been more robust. Despite a tough budget environment, our security assistance has increased every single year. We are investing in new capabilities. We're providing Israel with more advanced technology the types of products and systems that only go to our closest friends and allies. And make no mistake: We will do what it takes to preserve Israel's qualitative military edge because Israel must always have the ability to defend itself, by itself, against any threat.

The question this raises is could Israel preserve both its qualitative military edge and the ability to defend itself, by itself against any threat if, among others, Saudi Arabia was not ruled by a pro-US dictatorship?

If not, then Barack Obama as US President doing what it takes to preserve Israel's advantage means working to ensure that Saudi Arabia continues to be ruled by what is effectively a colonial government subordinate to the US.

We've seen before that Saudi Arabia spends more than 2.5 times as much as Israel does on its military.

Military spending

Rank	Country	Spending ($)	% of GDP	Per capita ($)
8	Saudi Arabia	42,917,000,000	11.2%	1,524
18	Israel	13,001,000,000	6.3%	1,882

We've seen that the vast majority of Arab populations consider Israel one of the two primary threats to them. (With a majority considering the US itself the other.)

Name TWO countries that you think pose the biggest threat to you.

Israel 71%
United States 59%
Iran 18%

Westerners like the misleading poll result that Arab populations are "prepared for peace" if Israel returns ALL of the territory Israel captured in 1967. But let's look at that result more closely. (Same poll as above.)

Which of the following statements is closer to your view?

24% - Prepared for peace if Israel is willing to return all 1967 territories including East Jerusalem, and Arab governments should put more effort into this

43% - Prepared for peace if Israel is willing to return all 1967 territories including East Jerusalem, but Israel will never give up these territories easily

23% - Even if Israel returns all 1967 territories, Arabs should continue to fight

Despite the contorted and indirect way this this question is posed, its result is that only 24% of Arab populations want their governments to put more effort into getting Israel to return all 1967 territories. Worded as it is, if this poll is correct, the official position of the pro-US colonial dictatorships may still only have the support of distinct minorities of their populations.

I'll also note that it would not be inconsistent for a person to be "prepared for peace if Israel returns all 1967 territories and want his or her government to put more effort into this" while also believing Israel is not legitimate, should not exist, and that a transition to Arab/Muslim majority rule would still be preferable to Israel returning all 1967 territories.

43% of these populations would be "prepared for peace" if Israel was to return ALL of the land captured in 1967 without any additional effort from their governments. Barack Obama does not call for Israel returning all 1967 territories. No Israeli leader, left or right, has ever offered to do so.

Leaving aside the difference between to accept and to be "prepared for peace", how many of these 43% would be prepared for peace if instead of returning all captured land, Israel was to offer a resolution along the outlines that Israel's supporters discuss: Israel annexes territory where there are currently large settlements, offers a very limited right to return, if any, and the remaining Palestine is demilitarized and physically blocked by Israeli or US troops from Jordanian territory? Let's just say the pollsters of Brookings would prefer you not to know the answer to that question. I'm sure for good reason from their points of view, as Western supporters of Zionism as a project.

We've seen a poll of the Iranian people that asks about acceptance of Israel without Brookings' misdirection. Unlike that of Saudi Arabia Iran's population is mostly non-Arab and mostly not Sunni. There is no reason to expect the opposition of the people of Saudi Arabia to Israel to be less than that of the Iranian people.

18. Level of agreement - The state of Israel is illegitimate and should not exist.

Strong Agreement: 51.9%
Mild Agreement: 14.6% (total agree, 66.5%)
Neutral: 21.1%
Mild Disagreement: 4.6%
Strong Disagreement: 3.9% (total disagree 8.5%)

Saudi Arabia does not have to cooperate with an explicit US pledge to be militarily inferior to a country that spends 60% less than it does on arms. It is absurd to think a government that represents the values, perceptions and sensibilities of the people of Saudi Arabia would do so. Democracy for Saudi Arabia would mean at least taking the risk that the US would be unable to maintain its commitment to Israel. Barack Obama stood before the audience at AIPAC and said that it is a risk he would not take.

The US' founding value of democracy - as well as Obama's poetic and dishonest statement that he believes freedom is a gift deserved by all of God's children - is not quite as sacrosanct as the string of colonial dictatorships Obama maintains for the sake of Israel, including Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Kuwait, UAE and others.

Syria as a strategic issue for Barack Obama

I'll leave a segment of Barack Obama's interview with the Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg without much comment for now.

GOLDBERG: Can you just talk about Syria as a strategic issue? Talk about it as a humanitarian issue, as well. But it would seem to me that one way to weaken and further isolate Iran is to remove or help remove Iran's only Arab ally.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Absolutely.

GOLDBERG: And so the question is: What else can this administration be doing?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, look, there's no doubt that Iran is much weaker now than it was a year ago, two years ago, three years ago. The Arab Spring, as bumpy as it has been, represents a strategic defeat for Iran, because what people in the region have seen is that all the impulses towards freedom and self-determination and free speech and freedom of assembly have been constantly violated by Iran. [The Iranian leadership is] no friend of that movement toward human rights and political freedom. But more directly, it is now engulfing Syria, and Syria is basically their only true ally in the region.

And it is our estimation that [President Bashar al-Assad's] days are numbered. It's a matter not of if, but when. Now, can we accelerate that? We're working with the world community to try to do that. It is complicated by the fact that Syria is a much bigger, more sophisticated, and more complicated country than Libya, for example -- the opposition is hugely splintered -- that although there's unanimity within the Arab world at this point, internationally, countries like Russia are still blocking potential UN mandates or action. And so what we're trying to do -- and the secretary of state just came back from helping to lead the Friends of Syria group in Tunisia -- is to try to come up with a series of strategies that can provide humanitarian relief. But they can also accelerate a transition to a peaceful and stable and representative Syrian government. If that happens, that will be a profound loss for Iran.

GOLDBERG: Is there anything you could do to move it faster?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, nothing that I can tell you, because your classified clearance isn't good enough. (Laughter.)

Obama is not motivated, never has said and likely never will say that he is motivated in Syria primarily by the goal of minimizing the loss of human life.

Do the people of Syria oppose the policies of the Assad government that Obama opposes? Syria's support for Hezbollah and Hamas? There has never been an indication that this is the case.

Do the people of Syria believe Israel is a legitimate state any more than the Iranian people who by a margin of seven to one believe Israel is an illegitimate state that should not exist? There is no reason to believe they do and good reason to believe they do not.

Jimmy Carter favors democracy for Egypt - in the distant indeterminate future

Jimmy Carter has become a caricature of Western colonialist from a century ago.

We'll recall Great Britain in 1922 offering formal independence constrained by a British prerogative to intervene in issues that it considered important.

When at last the combined forces of the occupying army and the Interior Ministry were able to quell months of strikes and protests, the British were compelled to reconsider their position towards Egypt. The eventual outcome of that process was the unilateral decision in March 1922 to grant Egypt a qualified independence. Although the country would be governed thereafter as a constitutional monarchy, the British retained the right to intervene in any matters seen to affect the security of imperial communications, the interests and safety of foreigners on Egyptian soil, the threat of foreign invasion, or the status of Egypt's relationship with the Sudan.

Western colonialism has always also had another aspect. Westerners presented their control over others' affairs as temporary, eventually to end, and as beneficial to the colonized. Despite the rhetoric, they actually ruled to favor their own perceived interests. But this rule was rhetorically in anticipation of later full sovereignty sometime in the indeterminate future.

British rhetoric constantly proclaimed that Britain's great colonial mission was to gradually bestow enlightened English traditions of parliamentary democracy and responsible government on "backward" colonial people.

This is exactly what Juan Cole evokes when he predicts that the military will retain power to the benefit of religious minorities and women. (A 'prediction' that the government he votes for can actively encourage, as Carter does here.) The same military that disenfranchised the entire country in favor of the United States for the last 30 years is presented, of course dishonestly, hopefully as the guardians of democracy.

Recently, Egypt's pro-US military dictatorship has committed at least to the New York Times that it will continue to control foreign policy in matters of interest to the United States.

The new majority is likely to increase the difficulty of sustaining the United States’ close military and political partnership with post-Mubarak Egypt, though the military has said it plans to maintain a monopoly over many aspects of foreign affairs.

Jimmy Carter, who is liberal compared to most Americans and Westerners, has publicly expressed support for Egypt's military's efforts to retain the power necessary to keep its promise to US news organizations.

" 'Full civilian control' is a little excessive, I think"

also

"I don’t think it is going to be detrimental for the military to retain some special status."

and

“If the civilian leadership decided to give the SCAF immunity from prosecution, say, for the death of the people in Tahrir Square over the last few months, I would have no objection to that,” Mr. Carter said. Protecting the military budget from full civilian scrutiny might be another point where civilian political leaders could compromise, he said.

So Carter believes full civilian control is both unlikely and excessive - excessive defined in English as "going beyond the usual, necessary, or proper limit or degree". But it turns out, possibly in the same interview but reported by the Jerusalem Post instead of the New York Times, that while Carter believes full civilian control is excessive for the forseeable future, he wants to send a clear message to the pro-US military dictatorship that in some indeterminate future, beyond June or this year, he would favor full Egyptian civilian control of its military like Carter's own country has had for centuries:

"I think to have an abrupt change in the totality of the military authority at the end of June or this year is more than we can expect," Carter told Reuters in an interview.

"A clear message has to go out that in the future for Egypt, whenever that time comes, there will be complete civilian control over all aspects of the government affairs and the military will play its role under the direction of an elected president and an elected parliament."

"My guess is that the military would like to retain as much control as possible for as long as possible, still accepting the results of the revolution and the election," he said.

In the future for Egypt, whenever that time comes? (Another "prediction", this from a former US president about the behavior of an institution that has followed US directions for the last three decades.)

So for now, the backwards natives of Egypt should have their foreign policy controlled by the US. For now, according to Carter it would be excessive to Egyptians to control their own foreign policy instead of the military on behalf of the US as it promised the New York Times. But in some glorious future, according to Carter, "whenever it comes" Egypt will be ready to assert full civilian control over its military.

Under Barack Obama, just as much as under George Bush, Ronald Reagan or Carter himself, the United States' great colonial mission is to gradually bestow enlightened American traditions of democracy and responsible government on "backward" colonial people. But until then, unless the people of Egypt (hopefully) thwart its plans, the US will set Egypt's foreign policy.

What role is the US playing in Syria and why?

The US' public position on Syria has been widely circulated and is well known by now.

"We don't want to take actions that would contribute to the further militarization of Syria because that could take the country down a dangerous path," White House press secretary Jay Carney said. "But we don't rule out additional measures if the international community should wait too long and not take the kind of action that needs to be taken."

The administration previously had said flatly that more weapons are not the answer to the Syrian situation. There had been no mention of "additional measures."

It is also well known that formal US treaty ally Turkey and US colonies Saudi Arabia and Qatar have been substantially supporting the opposition, and this foreign support has helped fund and organize the armed resistance to the Syrian government. The US has been at least quietly supportive of this assistance. There are persistent rumors that the US, particularly Jeffrey Feltman, the US Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, has had a major role in coordinating this campaign.

I do not have evidence that these rumors are true. My expectation is that decades from now records will be declassified that detail US/Israeli involvement and direction of this campaign, just as almost half a century after the US' 1953 toppling of Iran's Mossedegh, contrary to vehement contemporary denials, the US involvement in that program was made public.

But quiet support in the widely known actions of the US' allies and colonies is enough to establish complicity even before evidence of direct involvement which may become available in the future. Here is Hillary Clinton expressing support for the efforts of others to support Syria's armed opposition:

"There will be increasingly capable opposition forces. They will from somewhere, somehow find the means to defend themselves as well as begin offensive measures," she told reporters after taking part in a London conference on Somalia.

"Somewhere, somehow" in this case means from the US' allies and colonies. There are some points that bear repeating about supporting armed resistance to any government, good or bad.

1) Armed resistance vastly increases the amount of deaths in any anti-government campaign. Syria's armed opposition creating actual firefights with the government has increased the total number of people who've died in this conflict by at least tenfold and quite plausibly 100-fold.

2) Every sovereign government, good or bad, will forcibly resist foreign-supported armed opposition to its rule. If foreigners were to provide weapons or funds to acquire weapons to anti-US government forces in Miami or Seattle and those forces managed to incorporate those cities into "liberated territory", or managed to remove all security forces loyal to Washington DC from those cities and surrounding areas, then Barack Obama's campaign to regain control of those cities would look very similar to Assad's campaigns to restore effective central government authority over Homs and Hama. The rhetoric would also be the same. Obama would call any such armed resistance foreign-influenced traitors and terrorists.

Barack Obama just relinquishing those cities would not be a consideration, much less would his leaving power be. US colonies of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Jordan, Kuwait and others would behave identically to Obama or Assad except for differences in the amounts and types of weapons at their disposal.

Would there still be an armed resistance of there was no outside support? Possibly. Clearly any armed resistance would be smaller. Clearly fewer people would be dying. An easy response to an argument that an intervention is having little to no effect on the outcome is to ask, then why are they bothering? Why are they wasting money?

It is safe to say that at the very least ten times as many Syrians are dying in the current conflict as would have died if the US' allies and colonies did not intervene. If 7,000 people have died, at least 6,300 would be alive but for a campaign the Barack Obama administration, did not disapprove of even if it did not organize it.

That raises the question of why. If we start from the presumption that Barack Obama does not favor more Syrians dying to fewer all things being equal, then what makes things unequal? What could the US gain from armed conflict in Syria that Barack Obama considers worth thousands of Syrian lives?

On this question Obama administration officials are open that they hope a future Syria will not be aligned with Iran. Here is Feltman on Syria and Iran:

"Syria is essential to the extremely negative role that Iran has been able to play in the region. Take Hezbollah. The transit routes for the arms to Hezbollah are via Syria. The facilitation that Iran gives to Hezbollah to undermine the state of Lebanon, to put Israel at risk, to basically destabilize the region, it comes via Syria. Syria is basically Iran's only friend."

Feltman's ideas about Iran playing an extremely negative role in the region and Syria's help in playing that role bears closer inspection. We will see how profoundly anti-democratic Feltman's contention is.

We can start with Lebanon, a country that Feltman thinks is being undermined by Hezbollah. Lebanon had elections that were considered fair in 2009. The electoral alliance that Hezbollah participated in won 54.5% of the popular vote. (Barack Obama beat John McCain with 52.9% of the popular vote.) While Feltman believes Hezbollah's arms are a threat, the people of Lebanon have not voted to support Feltman. Most of Lebanon's voters do not believe Hezbollah is an undermining, rather than representative influence. Feltman hopes though that Assad's overthrow will allow the United States to overrule Lebanon's voters.

From Lebanon, let's look at Iran which Feltman believes plays an extremely negative role in the region. Iran's government represents people who, by a seven to one margin, do not consider Israel a legitimate country.

18. Level of agreement - The state of Israel is illegitimate and should not exist.

Strong Agreement: 51.9%
Mild Agreement: 14.6% (total agree, 66.5%)
Neutral: 21.1%
Mild Disagreement: 4.6%
Strong Disagreement: 3.9% (total disagree 8.5%)

Barack Obama and Jeffrey Feltman disagree with the people of Iran and describe Iran's policies that are consistent with those beliefs to be extremely negative. But Obama and Feltman would disagree with any democratic or representative government of Iran.

This direct question asked of the Iranian population gives a very stark result that is very difficult to minimize. Since then, I've never seen this direct question asked again in a publicly available source of the Iranian population or any population in Israel's region.

On the other hand the Palestinians are mostly Sunni, and Arab. If there is an important distance between Sunni and Shiite and between Arab and Persian, then the populations of majority Sunni Arab states are likely to consider Israel illegitimate by even larger margins.

The questions we do see asked of Arab populations are more constrained, such as this from Brookings:

Which of the following statements is closer to your view?

24% - Prepared for peace if Israel is willing to return all 1967 territories including East Jerusalem, and Arab governments should put more effort into this

43% - Prepared for peace if Israel is willing to return all 1967 territories including East Jerusalem, but Israel will never give up these territories easily

23% - Even if Israel returns all 1967 territories, Arabs should continue to fight

But Israel is not willing to return all 1967 territories including East Jerusalem. Israel continuously says it is not and the respondents to the poll believe it is not.

So what the Brookings poll asks is "If something was true, that you know is in fact not true and will not be true, would you in that imaginary world be 'prepared for peace' with Israel?". 67% of Arab respondents in one form or other responded yes to that question. 67% of Arabs would, in that imaginary world, be 'prepared for peace' with Israel.

Note that 'prepared for peace' does not imply that they would even then consider Israel legitimate, that they would want to maintain that peace if circumstances such as Israel's current military edge were to change, or that they would not support efforts to end Israel's military advantage over its neighbors. What is being asked by Brookings is not a meaningful question. Every Western poll I've seen since 2006 supposedly asking non-Jewish Middle East populations about their acceptance of Israel has been flawed in this way.

Respondents pointedly, deliberately and misleadingly are not asked by Brookings if they accept Israel in the real world. Here, Brookings is actively working to mislead its Western audiences.

The Brookings poll is not inconsistent with and does not contradict the Readers Digest poll. It is a safe assumption that if asked the same direct question Readers Digest asked the Iranians, the people of Syria would disagree with Feltman and Obama about Israel and about what kind of role would be positive or negative even more vehemently than the people of Iran.

These polls and these non-Jewish populations of the Middle East expressing disagreement with Barack Obama and Jeffrey Feltman bring us back to the question of why things are not equal, why Barack Obama would prefer to see thousands of Syrians die than oppose the formation of an armed resistance in Syria.

If the goal is to prevent Syria from playing the negative role in the region Iran plays, then there are at least three ways to accomplish this. One might be a democratic Syria that agrees with Obama and Feltman that opposing Israel is a negative effect on the region. The US and its supporters lie when they present this as the outcome they hope for. There is no reason to believe Syria's voters would agree with Obama and Feltman about what kind of role Syria should play in the region and good reason to believe they would disagree.

There are two other ways: 2) Syria can come under the control of a pro-US dictatorship, rejoining the colonial structure that Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt (for now), Jordan and Kuwait are part of. This is the colonial structure Iran escaped when the US-imposed Shah was overthrown and which made it possible for Iran to now pursue, with Syria, what Feltman and Obama consider a negative role in the region.

Short of that, Syria might, the US, Feltman and Obama may hope, ultimately reach what Obama would like to see in Egypt, a government that has a democratic facade but whose policy on issues the US cares about are set by the United States. Juan Cole and the Heritage Foundation favorably describe this arrangement as "partly free" for Morocco and Kuwait. Jimmy Carter openly supports this arrangement for Egypt. Cole doesn't openly advocate this outcome but refuses to offer any criticism of this arrangement if, as it has promised, Egypt's military was to bring it about.

The last way is that Syria can be destroyed. Whatever else happens, the destruction of a country is the most common outcome of a civil war that results from foreign-supported armed opposition fighting the government. Syria may never have a government that agrees with Feltman or Obama about what constitutes a negative effect on the region, but if its ability to impact the region beyond its borders is crippled, that would be the next best thing.

Hopefully Syria will, despite the efforts of the US, its allies and its colonies, avoid a further escalation of its civil war. Other than the September 2001 attacks on the US homeland, the US has not suffered much to deter it from policies that result in large amounts of death of Arabs and Muslims to subjugate the region on Israel's behalf. I hope this lack of consequences for the US continues, because I oppose people dying.

I also hope though, that the US one way or another stops being an evil nation, a nation that would rather see thousands of Syrians die then see them live in a country free to play what Feltman and Obama (but not Syria's own population) consider a negative role in the region by threatening Israel.

Why so many fewer deaths in Bahrain than Syria?

Foreigners arming an opposition in any country is an active attempt to create a civil war that will almost always be more destructive than government repression of protest. Civil war often does not result, after all of the fighting has ended, in a less repressive regime than before and at least for those who died cannot be considered worth it.

Countries that are part of the hegemonic structure the US maintains in the Middle East on Israel's behalf - Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia; pro-US factions in Lebanon and US formal NATO ally Turkey are equipping and supplying the armed opposition to the Syrian government.

While the US' colonies and allies in the region are arming the opposition, the Obama administration officially has opposed providing the opposition with weapons.

In coordinated messages, the White House and State Department said they still hope for a political solution. But faced with the daily onslaught by the Assad regime against Syrian civilians, officials dropped the administration's previous strident opposition to arming anti-regime forces. It remained unclear, though, what, if any, role the U.S. might play in providing such aid.

"We don't want to take actions that would contribute to the further militarization of Syria because that could take the country down a dangerous path," White House press secretary Jay Carney told reporters. "But we don't rule out additional measures if the international community should wait too long and not take the kind of action that needs to be taken."

At minimum, if the US opposed the further militarization of Syria there are many things it could have been saying and doing over the past year that it has not. Barack Obama, typically, seems more concerned with presenting an image of non-involvement than with the amount of unnecessary and avoidable deaths. What is public about the US' position, that Assad must step down as a precondition to any resolution is, by design, unacceptable to any sovereign country facing foreign-supported armed opposition and predictably leads to increased suffering of Syrians people.

Despite fairly transparent lies, the United States is today working to subject Syria to a civil war that it hopes, regardless of who wins in the end, will weaken the country so that it will pose less of a strategic threat to Israel. This is what was done to Iraq, most intensely after the 2003 US invasion of that country.

In Bahrain, Qatar, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, the US under Barack Obama actively assists in maintaining governments as unrepresentative as Assad's in Syria. If Israel's viability was not the US' primary regional concern, all four of these countries could gracefully transition to representative governments. Civil war is not necessary for the US to support democracy if that was the US' objective.

The US can and should withhold and threaten to withhold military and intelligence cooperation from its colonies to increase the pressure for graceful transitions to representative government. Even if those dictatorships were to resist US pressure, the US could withdraw its support and no longer be morally complicit in their repression of their people.

But alas, the United States is the most evil nation on Earth today. The people of Syria, just as much as the people of Palestine and also the people of the US' colonies of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan, UAE and others are suffering from the US' idea that an enforced majority state for fewer than six million Jewish people in Palestine outweighs the rights and even lives of over 400 million non-Jews in that region.

Former CIA officer Robert Baer on the US colony of Saudi Arabia

I've recently come across a book by former CIA officer Robert Baer, Sleeping With The Devil:
How Washington Sold Our Soul for Saudi Crude.

The Saudi government probably spends more per capita than any other country in the world on arms. (It acknowledges only that it spends 13 percent of its gross domestic product, but half of its revenue is earmarked for the military.) That’s basically without having to provide for its own external defense; U.S. carrier groups and F-15 combat air patrols over the Gulf take care of that. (And the U.S. still manages to spend less than 4 percent of GDP on the military.) Also, Saudi Arabia has never fought in any Arab-Israeli war, from 1948 until today. In fact, the Al Sa’ud’s military hasn’t fought a war since the 1930s. To understand the significance of its spending on arms, look at the French for comparison. Although France has a modern, combat-ready mobile army that fights in a handful of African bush wars and participates in peace missions all over the world, it spends only 2.57 percent of GDP on its military.

Baer presents the Saudi monarchy as the corrupt alternative to the Muslim Brotherhood, which, to Baer includes Al-Qaeda and which would control the country if its leaders were elected.

This fantasy of a democracy is corrupting foolishness. We all know what version of “democracy” the State Department has in mind for Saudi Arabia. (Think Kuwait.) It’s insulting to try to make us believe it’s the real thing, just as it’s degrading for all those executive-branch officials and spokespersons who get trotted out to pay lip service to the myth. Say that the truth is something else for long enough, and you’ll forget what the truth really is.

In fact, Baer's position is that before allowing the Muslim Brotherhood to take control of the oil resources available, the US should be prepared to directly take control of the oil wells in Saudi Arabia by force.

Even if we confine a takeover to Saudi Arabia, we couldn’t count on it going smoothly. Whether the House of Sa’ud were still in power or had been supplanted by some sort of Wahhabi putsch, we would still have to contend with all those weapons Washington sold the Saudis, and all those fighter pilots and infantry officers trained by American military personnel and private contractors to use the planes and other weapons. Happily, the U.S. has an adequate base of operations in Qatar. Additionally, U.S.-trained Saudi forces would realize the futility of resisting, in part because they know that however many planes and missile launchers they have, the U.S. has the next generation in far greater numbers. Also, corruption in the kingdom is so thorough that spare parts for its planes and tanks would quickly be truly spare and sparse.

Sure, terrorism would likely increase, locally and globally. Al Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, you name it - none is going down without a fight. Even if the Saudis aren’t widely loved in the Middle East, the enemy of my enemy is still my friend. Vilified for the invasion of Iraq, the U.S. would take an even worse beating in international public-opinion polls. We would have to run roughshod over international organizations and our own long-standing principles, although the newly promulgated “doctrine of preemptive warfare” would certainly provide cover. But would all that be worse than standing idly by as the House of Sa’ud collapsed and the world’s largest known oil reserves fell into the hands of Muslim Brotherhood-inspired fundamentalists dedicated to jihad against Israel and the West? I don’t think so. Some things are more calamitous than others, and if the Bush-Cheney administration knows anything well, it ought to be how to rebuild and run an oil field.

Basically what one would expect a former CIA officer to write. A cog in the US' imperial apparatus, but never getting any deep appreciation of what that means. On the other hand, details are available in this kind of work that are difficult to find publicly discussed.

Who is going to tell Israel that Iran has legal nuclear weapons capabilities?

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

For the first time, I've seen a US media source reach the logical conclusion that sanctions will not prevent Iran from achieving the capabilities Japan, Brazil, Canada and many other countries have legally acquired within the NPT. A military strike would not prevent it. Nothing the US can do would prevent Iran from attaining legal nuclear weapons capabilities, so the US cannot stop Iran from acquiring these capabilities.

Andrea Mitchell (MSNBC): But what General Dempsey said and what other US officials are saying is that they do not believe Iran has actually made the decision to go and produce a bomb. Yes, they want to have the capacity and they want to develop, get the equipment, enrich to 20% and get the fuel ready to make the next leap to 90% for a weapon but that they have not actually made the decision. Do you agree?

Aaron David Miller (Guest): Maybe yes and maybe no. I think it's impossible to know. Unless you change the motivational character of the mullocracy in Tehran which is going to be very difficult to do without a new regime, then it seems to me that Iran like North Korea, like India, like Pakistan, to a degree even like Israel will want a weapon. It's a form of deterrence. It deals with their profound insecurities and can cover any regional ambitions that they may harbor. Now, whether or not they made a decision or whether or not they are rational actors and would be delayed or be convinced in a compelling way to not move forward is another matter. One thing that is clear to me, if we had no sanctions, if there were no cyber-attacks and even no threats of military action, then the Iranians would already actually have the capacity already to produce a weapon. It's important that we keep the pressure up.

MSNBC: Do you think the pressure alone could prevent them from proceeding?

Guest: I don't. I think diplomacy right now is not an option. A military option by the Israelis would be like mowing the grass. They could not do anything more than retard -- for them it may be good enough to retard for a year to three, but it's like mowing the grass, the grass is going to grow back and this time with a legitimacy and an intensity that the Iranians will use to actually accelerate their own program. So if there is no diplomatic solution and if there's no military action right now, then we drift. And the longer we drift the greater the chances over time that the Iranians will in fact develop a capacity.

MSNBC: What is the bottom line here?

Guest: The bottom line is ...

MSNBC: They are going to get the bomb whether we try to stop them or not?

Guest: I think the bottom line is that they will acquire at some point the capacity to actually produce a weapon if they want to, if they want to go that way.

Now of course Miller is deliberately using the word "capacity" to mean weapon. His examples of countries with capacity are not Brazil, Japan, Canada, Germany or any of the many countries that have legal nuclear weapons capabilities. His examples are India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel.

Andrea Mitchell along with Miller is calling the capacity, legal under the NPT, to build a weapon "the bomb".

But the important issue is that there is an admission, even by a "former State Department negotiator" that sanctions and military attacks both cannot prevent Iran from gaining legal nuclear weapons capabilities.

Once a US President is able to say this publicly, there is no longer any dispute over Iran's nuclear program.

Israel wants there to be this dispute, and therefore these threats, these sanctions and these covert actions against Iran anyway, not because of the nuclear issue but because like probably every non-Jewish Middle Eastern population, Iran's population does not consider Israel legitimate and a government that reflects its population's views should be sabotaged just for that.

Almost no Americans consider Iran the most important issue

I don't know much about Poll Position, but it seems to be following standard and therefore reliable polling practices.

Almost no Americans consider Iran the most important issue facing the US' next president. The result is close to the margin of error, so it is impossible to confidently claim that the percentage of the US population who consider Iran the most important issue is greater than zero.

Americans believe the economy will be the number one issue facing whomever is elected U.S. president in November.

In our national scientific polling, we asked Americans to identify the most important issue facing the newly-elected president.

In response, 75% said the economy, 13% said health care, 3% said terrorism, 3% said Iran, 6% said some other issue, and 2% expressed no opinion.

Americans of all political affiliations agreed: 78% of Democrats, 74% of Republicans, and 72% of independent pinpointed the economy as issue number one for the president-elect.

While this is the response I would have expected when asking about the single most important issue, I suspect a relatively low proportion of Americans would even put Iran into the top three issues.

One conclusion I would draw is that the US does not have a population that would be willing to accept significant costs to make sure Iran does not enrich uranium.

More Americans than not believe Iran would respond to an attack by trying to attack the US mainland:

In our national scientific telephone survey, we asked this question: “If Israel or the U.S. attacks nuclear sites in Iran, do you believe that Iran or its allies will attempt to attack the U.S. mainland?”

49% said yes, 32% said no, and 19% expressed no opinion.

Democrats (50%), Republicans (47%), and independents (49%) agreed on the issue.

Americans do favor supporting Israel if Israel was to attack Iran.

Our national scientific telephone poll found Republicans would favor U.S. backing of Israel striking Iran by a 64%-15% margin, while Democrats would oppose doing so 47%-23%. Independents side with Republicans, backing the U.S. supporting any Israeli military action on Iran 51%-21%.

Overall nationwide, Americans favored backing any Israeli military action against Iranian nuclear facilities by a 47%-27% margin.

These Americans are far less informed than the US' foreign policy community, but would likely reverse positions and create a damaging backlash if the US ended up paying a heavy cost for any attack and Iran after the dust settled had either nuclear capabilities or nuclear weapons anyway.

Why the US and Israel will not attack Iran

There is a consensus in the US policy establishment that attacking Iran would not resolve or improve the US' position with respect to the nuclear issue, while Iran's responses would be costly for the US. I've recently come across two expressions of that idea that I want to leave here.

The first is from a former US intelligence official.

U.S. intelligence officials are skeptical. Former CIA Director Michael V. Hayden told a group of foreign policy experts last month that Israel is not capable of inflicting significant damage on Iran's nuclear sites. Some are situated at the outer range of Israeli bombers, and others are underground, he said.

"The Israelis aren't going to [attack Iran] … they can't do it, it's beyond their capacity," Hayden said. "They only have the ability to make this worse."

A monthlong U.S. bombing campaign would inflict far more damage, Hayden said, but it wouldn't be worth it. The George W. Bush administration studied the issue, he said.

"The consensus was that [attacking Iran] would guarantee that which we are trying to prevent: an Iran that will spare nothing to build a nuclear weapon and that would build it in secret," Hayden said.

Suzanne Maloney expressed the same idea at a Brookings Institution panel earlier this month.

In terms of the New York Times Magazine article, I think we could do a whole session on that and I think all of my colleagues would have opinions on the number of questions that you posed. I will answer very briefly that I think -- I remain a sort of hopeful skeptic on the prospect of an Israeli attack, although I think the prospects today are higher than they have probably ever been, even after years of anticipation and expectation that such a strike would be imminent. I think the world jitters are legitimate this time around. I think the after-effects would be disastrous for U.S. interests and, for that matter, for Israeli interests, and it would not set back the program significantly enough to justify those after-effects.

It is fairly well understood in the United States that an attack on Iran would not achieve any US objective worth the risks and costs. As long as that is the case, we can be confident that we will not see an attack from either the United States, or from Israel, a country that, to the degree it is viable, is only viable because of US support.

If you want to believe the Syria conflict is winding down, read Thierry Meyssan

According to Thierry Meyssan, after Russia and China's veto of the UNSC resolution, the US dropped its support for a civil war in Syria and though it has not been announced publicly, the supplies for Syria's armed opposition are now drying up.

If this is true, then Syria is avoiding the fate of Iraq and tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands more Syrians will be alive two years from now than would be alive if the Barack Obama administration of the US had felt able to go through with its plans.

I hope it is true, but I don't see much evidence either inside or outside Meyssan's article that it is. Anyway, I'll excerpt the Meyssan's article about a possible resolution to the Syrian conflict and encourage everyone to read it in full.

On 7 February, a large Russian delegation, including the highest ranking foreign intelligence officials, arrived in Damascus where it was greeted by cheering crowds, aware that Russia’s return to the international scene marked the end of their nightmare. The capital, but also Aleppo, the second largest city, were decked out in white, blue, red, and people marched behind banners written in Cyrillic. At the presidential palace, the Russian delegation joined those of other states, including Turkey, Iran and Lebanon. A series of agreements were reached to re-establish peace. Syria has returned 49 military instructors captured by the Syrian army. Turkey intervened to obtain the release of the abducted Iranian engineers and pilgrims, including those held by the French (incidentally, Lieutenant Tlass who sequestered them on behalf of the DGSE was liquidated). Turkey has ceased all support for the "Free Syrian Army", closed down its facilities (except the one on the NATO base at Incirlik), and turned over its commander, Colonel Riad el-Assad. Russia, which is the guarantor of the agreements, has been allowed to reactivate the former Soviet listening base on Mount Qassioum.

The next day, the US State Department informed the Syrian opposition in exile that it could no longer count on its military aid. Realizing that they have betrayed their country to no avail, the Syrian National Council members went in search of new sponsors. One of them even went so far as to write to Benjamin Netanyahu asking him to invade Syria.

Armed foreign-supported opposition forces establishing "liberated territory" by which I mean territory outside of the control of the formal central government is a recipe for one thing: civil war that leads to at least an order of magnitude more death than would have happened otherwise. If Russia does enable Syria to avoid that fate, then Russia and China by their UNSC vetoes, are the heroes of 2012.

Mohamed ElBaradei is hopeful about Egypt's political system

The key question in Egypt, and I think despite more coverage of both the Syrian conflict and Iran's nuclear issue, the key question right now in the Middle East is what will Egypt's new constitution look like. How much power will the Egyptian people have, what powers to set policy, if any, will the military retain to protect Israel from Egypt's voters?

We don't know how powerful Egypt's parliament will be after the transfer of power, but we know Egypt's voters have decided that Islamists will have a dominant voice in that body. Mohamed ElBaradei, much to his credit, has expressed absolutely no anxiety over this reality.

Some are skeptical about the influence of the Islamists. After decades of banishment from the political scene, they have no experience in governing. Before the revolution, we fought together; in the new Egypt, we have differing perspectives. On the eve of January 28 last year, two of their leaders were arrested leaving my home. One is now the speaker of the parliament. I called him to wish him success. I predict the Islamists will embrace other political factions, support free markets and be pragmatic.

I'm still optimistic that efforts to prevent the people of Egypt from controlling the policy set by their government will fail. It looks like in that I am in agreement with ElBaradei.

The four stage Russian proposal on Iran's nuclear program

We've heard rumors of this proposal, but never seen details. A former Iranian negotiator, S. Hossein Mousavian, has told a Japanese news publication the outline of the plan. This proposal is inconsistent with the US demand that Iran relinquish the right to enrich uranium. It does keep all of Iran's enriched uranium in the relatively easy to bomb location of Natanz. Indications from the beginning have been that the US rejected the proposal.

As ''Step 1,'' Iran should take action to limit its uranium enrichment program to just one existing site at Natanz and Iran is also prohibited from adding new centrifuges or producing new-generation centrifuges. In return for this, P5-plus-one would suspend part of the international sanctions stipulated in the U.N. Security Council Resolution 1929.

In the next phase, Iran would allow the IAEA's surveillance of centrifuges and implement an additional arrangement with the IAEA for enhanced design inspection of nuclear-related facilities, while Iran's enriched uranium production rate would be limited to 5 percent or lower, far below the weapon-grade enrichment rate of 90 percent. The P5-plus-one side would begin gradually lifting the unilateral sanctions by the United States and key European nations.

During ''Step 3,'' Iran would implement an additional protocol with the IAEA -- an agreement between the nuclear watchdog and each nation that would allow broader and more intrusive IAEA inspections of atomic energy facilities. At the same time, P5-plus-one would suspend all U.N. Security Council sanctions.

In the next and last stage, Iran should suspend all uranium enrichment and related activities for three months, while P5-plus-one would begin final lifting of all sanctions and remove the Iranian nuclear dispute from the IAEA Board of Governors agenda. The P5-plus-one side would also start to implement ''incentives on cooperation in different fields.''

There clearly are still many missing details. There is no indication here of how much time and what would prompt the move from one stage to another. An important question for this, if it was the basis for negotiations, would be what happens after the 90 day suspension.

Sanctions are predictably not going to force Iran to suspend enrichment or to negotiate on the basis of relinquishing that right. In fact, during sanctions, Iran will put more facts on the ground that it will refuse to relinquish later. This plan, for example, was conceived before there was significant enrichment outside of Iran. Later plans may well require an acceptance of 20% enrichment in the reinforced underground facility at Fordow.

The pattern that has been established has been that delays in accepting Iranian enrichment lead to greater Iranian enrichment capabilities representing the floor for negotiations. Barack Obama's failure to accept Iranian enrichment so far has led to a significant increase in the amount and kinds of enrichment technology that Iran will have access to going forward.

Daniel Davies, D-Squared, explains that liars' claims cannot be salvaged

I was recently, in thinking about Syria, reminded of a classic blog post by Daniel Davies, that seems to have been first written in 2004. Maybe the single best blog post of its era and people who were reading English language blogs about the Middle East at the time likely will remember it.

Davies, unlike most Americans, did not expect that any weapons of mass destruction would be found in Iraq. None, not a small amount, not something that could be arguably mistaken for weapons of mass destruction. Just no weapons, the government of the US was lying to the people of the country. Afterwards he explained how he knew that.

This is a bigger segment that I'd usually copy, but it is from what seems to be an archival website with no advertising and one that I had trouble re-finding years later. Here is the heart of the post. I could not recommend more strongly reading it in full.

Good ideas do not need lots of lies told about them in order to gain public acceptance. I was first made aware of this during an accounting class. We were discussing the subject of accounting for stock options at technology companies. There was a live debate on this subject at the time. One side (mainly technology companies and their lobbyists) held that stock option grants should not be treated as an expense on public policy grounds; treating them as an expense would discourage companies from granting them, and stock options were a vital compensation tool that incentivised performance, rewarded dynamism and innovation and created vast amounts of value for America and the world. The other side (mainly people like Warren Buffet) held that stock options looked awfully like a massive blag carried out my management at the expense of shareholders, and that the proper place to record such blags was the P&L account.

Our lecturer, in summing up the debate, made the not unreasonable point that if stock options really were a fantastic tool which unleashed the creative power in every employee, everyone would want to expense as many of them as possible, the better to boast about how innovative, empowered and fantastic they were. Since the tech companies’ point of view appeared to be that if they were ever forced to account honestly for their option grants, they would quickly stop making them, this offered decent prima facie evidence that they weren’t, really, all that fantastic.

Application to Iraq. The general principle that good ideas are not usually associated with lying like a rug* about their true nature seems to have been pretty well confirmed. In particular, however, this principle sheds light on the now quite popular claim that “WMDs were only part of the story; the real priority was to liberate the Iraqis, which is something that every decent person would support”.

Fibbers’ forecasts are worthless. Case after miserable case after bloody case we went through, I tell you, all of which had this moral. Not only that people who want a project will tend to make inaccurate projections about the possible outcomes of that project, but about the futility of attempts to “shade” downward a fundamentally dishonest set of predictions. If you have doubts about the integrity of a forecaster, you can’t use their forecasts at all. Not even as a “starting point”. By the way, I would just love to get hold of a few of the quantitative numbers from documents prepared to support the war and give them a quick run through Benford’s Law.

Application to Iraq This was how I decided that it was worth staking a bit of credibility on the strong claim that absolutely no material WMD capacity would be found, rather than “some” or “some but not enough to justify a war” or even “some derisory but not immaterial capacity, like a few mobile biological weapons labs”. My reasoning was that Powell, Bush, Straw, etc, were clearly making false claims and therefore ought to be discounted completely, and that there were actually very few people who knew a bit about Iraq but were not fatally compromised in this manner who were making the WMD claim. Meanwhile, there were people like Scott Ritter and Andrew Wilkie who, whatever other faults they might or might not have had, did not appear to have told any provable lies on this subject and were therefore not compromised.

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* We also learned in accounting class that the difference between “making a definite single false claim with provable intent to deceive” and “creating a very false impression and allowing it to remain without correcting it” is not one that you should rely upon to keep you out of jail. Even if your motives are noble.

First I'd just like to repeat: "the futility of attempts to “shade” downward a fundamentally dishonest set of predictions. If you have doubts about the integrity of a forecaster, you can’t use their forecasts at all. Not even as a “starting point”." I really like that language.

How does this apply to Syria?

For most of the summer we would get casualty reports every single day of ten or twelve people being killed in peaceful protests by the Syrian government. That is a lie. A straight up lie, it did not happen. People may well have been dying, but not in peaceful demonstrations every day for weeks. Especially not in demonstrations that weren't even generating images.

I've seen images of people wounded. I've seen images of damage done to structures. But none of people gathering peacefully at a square and shots ringing out. That certainly was not happening every day, and we were being told it was happening every day. We were being lied to.

Also, all of a sudden there were cities in Syria with no security force loyal to the government present. Non-violent demonstrations can't do that. Other things may have been true, but while we wait for evidence, we can be confident that many of the statements we've heard from US and Arab government and media sources have been lies. Because of that, we are safe assuming that every statement that we're reading, that we do not already have proof of, is a lie.

There is an important difference between the lies told about Iraq and the lies told about Syria though. Americans resent the lies told about Iraq because they led, most importantly, to 5,000 dead US soldiers, and also much less importantly to wasted money spent by the US government.

The lies about Syria are only leading to dead Syrians, who, like the hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqis, matter very close to not at all for most Americans. Americans are quite racist and bigoted over religion. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, even George W. Bush are more sophisticated and understand the importance of disguising their disdain for Arabs and Muslims better than some of the commenters who have posted on this blog in the past several months.

The US colonies of Saudi Arabia and Qatar are funding the campaign in Syria, so the Americans are not even feeling the loss of government revenues.

So we don't have proof that some the of the statements that have been presented to us in this campaign against Syria are false, but as Davies would say, we are making an important, common but avoidable error if we commit the fallacy of “giving known liars the benefit of the doubt”.