THEY LOOKED INTO THE SOUL OF PUTIN - AND FOUND AHMADINEJAD

.
.
.

Some of the politics behind the naming of the present Satan, the future Satan, their spawn and other categories of evil.

An article like this doesn't come along very often. The gear of history jumps a cog and is served up without the usual glass of kool-aid.

THE LEAD-UP

1. Rice and Gates left Moscow over the weekend launching an unusually open, harsh and coordinated attack against Putin coupled with various categories of threat including the overthrow of his government through the "color revolution" method which in this case utilizes “human rights activists” generally funded, organized and managed by organizations like National Endowment for Democracy (NED), the George Soros Open Society Institute, Freedom House and Gene Sharp's Albert Einstein Institution, a US intelligence asset used to spark "non-violent" regime change around the world on behalf of the US strategic agenda.

She says,

What the rest of the world hears

The Context

Poland and Czech based US missile defense systems is the *published* bone of contention (the US claims these "treaty busting" systems are needed to protect the "heart of Europe" from Iran (sic), while Russians believe their ultimate purpose is to take down the Russian pipeline monopoly - at least.)

2. Putin responds that he is traveling to Iran to attend the Caspian Sea summit. He will be the first Russian leader to travel to Iran since Josef Stalin in 1943.

As if to emphasize how extraordinary and threatening this is and adding real sizzle to the story, mysterious and "unknown" people from the shadows launch...

3. ...a disinformation campaign advising Putin that there are assassination plots waiting for him in Tehran.

Generally described here, and more explicitly here

4. Putin and Ahmadinejad scoff and respond that they will not be deterred by disinformation campaigns.


From *Tehran* Putin and Summit participants (Russia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan) warn...

1. ...the U.S. not to use Azerbaijan (home of the West's BTC pipeline and a former Soviet republic) to stage an attack on Iran.

2. ...and that, countries bordering the Caspian Sea must jointly back any oil pipeline projects in the region. Moscow has strong opposition to U.S.-backed efforts to build pipelines to deliver hydrocarbons to the West, bypassing Russia.

3. ...and while Putin refused to set a date for the start-up of Iran's first nuclear power plant, (already mostly) completed by Russia, he did say, "We are not going to renounce our obligations."

Enrons in the future


US oil companies have huge investments in the Caspian but have to ship their product through the Russian pipeline system. The western owned BTC pipeline alleviates the problem somewhat. Iran is the quickest, easiest and cheapest pipeline exit from the Caspian Sea. Immediately prior to the "Global War on Terror", Enron went bankrupt trying to get Turkmenistan gas by pipeline through Afghanistan bypassing Iran to supply its $3 billion Dabhol Power Plant in India - built by Bechtel, powered by GE turbines - unpaid for - and currently rusting away in Dabhol.

Meanwhile, don't forget the 'NATO of the East' - Shanghai Cooperation Organization

Or this guy,

And, of course, this kind of stuff goes on day in and day out.

And finally, in my search for information surrounding this turn of events I found this.

If you ever want to build a "conspiracy theory" of history, this website is an excellent model - just because you are paranoid doesn't mean they are not really after you.

PHOTO:
From left: Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev, Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Turkmenistan's President Gurbanguli Berdymukhamedov walk during the Caspian Sea leaders summit in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, Oct. 16, 2007. (AP Photo/RIA Novosti, Mikhail Klimentyev, Presidential Press Service)

AND NOW A WORD FROM THE BUTCHER OF YUGOSLAVIA

.
.
.

... less than two weeks after Sept. 11, he writes, a "senior general" told him, "We're going to attack Iraq. The decision has basically been made."

Six weeks later, Clark returned to Washington to see the same general and inquired whether the plan to strike Iraq was still under consideration. The general's response was stunning:

"'Oh, it's worse than that,' he said, holding up a memo on his desk. 'Here's the paper from the Office of the Secretary of Defense [then Donald Rumsfeld] outlining the strategy. We're going to take out seven countries in five years.' And he named them, starting with Iraq and Syria and ending with Iran."

While Clark doesn't name the other four countries, he has mentioned in televised interviews that the hit list included Lebanon, Libya, Somalia and Sudan.

CLINTON AND CLARK, THEY DID IT ONCE THEY CAN DO IT AGAIN, GO WITH A PROVEN TEAM

Key graph:

"Senator Clinton has the experience, good judgment and
the battle-tested character to face the challenges
ahead," Clark told The Associated Press.

Battle-tested, by god!

Clinton and Clark. It's alliterative. It rolls off
the tongue.

The War Goddess and her Four Star General!
Battle-tested!

DISMANTLING STRUCTURES OF DISCEPTION

In his view such powerful forces as official propaganda and state coercion distort human psychology and relationships and thus stifle intellectual development and social life in general.

"It is no easy task to gain some understanding of human affairs. In some respects, the task is harder than in the natural sciences. Mother Nature doesn't provide the answers on a silver platter, but at least she does not go out of her way to set up barriers to understanding. In human affairs, such barriers are the norm. It is necessary to dismantle the structures of deception erected by doctrinal systems. . . ."

He seeks to uncover how indoctrination systems work to prevent people from gaining a real and practical understanding of the major questions of our world, and how they enable intellectuals to exempt their government from criticism of the very same evils for which they easily (and rightly, but safely) condemn other governments.

Washington is well aware that Americans would not accept the real purposes of its policies and have to be fooled into accepting immoral acts of violence.

As Mark Twain wrote in 1900, those missionary idealists who have gone to convert the Chinese to Christianity should return home at once to save their own desperate countrymen from the sin of participating in the lynching of blacks:

PETRO DOLLARS BUILDING A REGIONAL ECONOMIC ANTI-HEGEMON

Via the Miami Herald:

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's government has pledged more than $8.8 billion in aid, financing and energy funding in Latin America and the Caribbean so far in 2007. Bandes is a Venezuelan state development bank. Below is a list of pledges sorted by type.

ENERGY:

- $3.55 billion. Nicaragua: To build 150,000 barrel-a-day oil refinery. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $1.6 billion. Estimated financing per year under preferential oil deals to at least 17 countries. (Source: Chavez, March 15)

- $340 million. Nicaragua: Grants and loans to supply oil, nine electricity generators. (Source: Venezuela government statement, March 7)

- $240 million. Bolivia: Exploration of gas and oil fields. (Source: Bolivian Hydrocarbons Ministry, Aug. 8)

- $170 million. Bolivia: To build two liquid natural gas extraction plants. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $100 million. Nicaragua: To supply 32 electricity generators. (Source: Chavez, Jan. 10)

- $89 million. Nicaragua: To build 120 megawatt electricity plant. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $80 million. Haiti: To build 10,000 barrel-a-day oil refinery. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $63.7 million. Jamaica: For state oil company to buy 49-percent stake in Jamaican refinery. (Source: Jamaican Energy Ministry, May 18)

- $56 million. Haiti: To build 60-megawatt electricity plant. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $30 million. Bolivia: To build diesel electricity generation plant. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $28 million. Bolivia: To build thermoelectric plant. (Source: Bolivian Hydrocarbons Ministry, Aug. 8)

- $8 million. Cuba: To build liquefied natural gas re-gasification plant. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $5 million. Bolivia: Electricity-saving project. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $4.7 million. Bolivia: To set up 15 service stations to distribute fuel. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $4 million. Haiti: To build LNG re-gasification plant. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $200,000. Ecuador: Donation of two drills for oil exploration. (Source: Chavez, Aug. 9)

ENERGY FUNDING TOTAL: $6.369 billion

FINANCING:

- $1 billion. Argentina: Planned bond purchases, including $500 million in bonds purchased in August. (Source: Chavez, Aug. 7)

- $100 million. Bolivia: Planned purchase of Bolivian government bonds. (Source: Cabezas, Aug. 2)

- $30 million. Nicaragua: Debt forgiveness. (Source: Chavez, Jan 10)

- $8 million. Guyana: Debt forgiveness. (Source: Rodolfo Sanz, Venezuela's deputy foreign minister for Latin America and the Caribbean, Aug. 9)

FINANCING TOTAL: $1.138 billion

DEVELOPMENT AID:

- $250 million. Fund to finance joint economic projects in region's socialist-oriented countries. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $150 million. Dominica: Funding for housing, airport upgrade, scholarships. (Source: Chavez, Feb. 15)

- $135 million. Argentina: Bandes loan for Sancor dairy cooperative. (Source: Venezuelan Finance Minister Rodrigo Cabezas, Feb. 22)

- $88 million. Nicaragua: Grants and loans for tractors, AIDS treatment, sending 86 Nicaraguan athletes to sports tournament, 100,000 Hepatitis B vaccines, etc. An additional $2 million listed below under humanitarian aid. (Source: Venezuelan government statement, March 7)

- $30 million. Bolivia: Bandes capital for low-interest loans. (Source: Bandes president, May 7)

- $25 million. Ecuador: Bandes capital for new branch to offer low-interest loans. (Source: Bandes President Rafael Isea Romero, May 24)

- $21 million. Haiti: Fund to build homes, acquire unspecified equipment and provide medical aid by supporting the work of Cuban specialists offering health care to Haitians. (Source: Venezuelan government statement, March 3)

- $20 million. Bolivia: Grants for local infrastructure projects in health, schools, sports and other areas. (Source: Bolivian Public Finance Minister Luis Arce, April 12).

- $20 million. Nicaragua: Loans for rural poor, health care and education. (Source: Chavez, Jan. 10)

- $20 million. Nicaragua: Capital for Bandes branch for low-interest agricultural loans. (Source: Bandes president, May 24)

- $10 million. Nicaragua: Funding for social projects. (Source: Chavez, Jan. 10)

- $2 million. Guyana: Donation to build a homeless shelter. (Source: Guyanese Foreign Minister Rudy Insanally, Aug. 2)

- $875,000. Bolivia: Computers to digitalize Bolivia's national identification card system. (Source: Bolivian government announcement, April 13.)

DEVELOPMENT AID TOTAL: $772 million

INFRASTRUCTURE:

- $350 million. Nicaragua: Donation to build Pacific-Atlantic highway. (Source: Nicaragua Infrastructure Minister Pablo Fernando Martinez, Jan. 22)

- $150 million. Bolivia: Asphalt plant. (Source: Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, April 30)

- $57 million. Haiti: Funding to expand Port-au-Prince and Cap-Haitien airports. (Source: Venezuelan government statement, March 3)

- $5.5 million. Bolivia: Funding for paving streets and other improvements to poor neighborhoods in La Paz. (Source: Bolivian government statement, July 14)

- $3 million. Haiti: Donation for garbage trucks. (Source: Chavez, March 13)

INFRASTRUCTURE AID TOTAL: $565.5 million

HUMANITARIAN AID:

- $15 million. Bolivia: Donation for flood victims. (Source: Chavez, Feb. 26 and March 2)

- $2 million. Nicaragua: Free medicine. Announced as part of larger $90 million in grants and loans. (Source: Venezuelan government statement, March 7)

- $1.5 million. Peru: Two planeloads of earthquake relief supplies, with more planned. (Armando Laguna, Venezuelan ambassador to Peru, Aug. 22)

HUMANITARIAN AID TOTAL: $18.5 million

MILITARY AID:

- $10 million. Bolivia: Funding to fix military barracks. (Source: Bolivian Defense Minister Walker San Miguel, May 21 and 22).

MILITARY TOTAL: $10 million

TOTAL OF PUBLIC PLEDGES: $8.87 billion

CREATING THE NEXT BIN LADIN: THE COMING CRIMINALIZATION OF ANTI-GLOBALISM

(Adam Gadahn,"Azzam The American", is the first American charged with treason since 1952)

"Azzam The American" freeze frames Bin Laden and puts words in his mouth.

from: Booman Tribune

the video freezes at about 1 minute and 58 seconds, and motion only resumes again at 12:30. The video then freezes again at 14:02 remains frozen until the end. All references to current events, such as the 62nd anniversary of the U.S. atomic bombing of Japan, and Sarkozy and Brown being the leaders of France and the UK, respectively, occur when the video is frozen! The words spoken when the video is in motion contain no references to contemporary events and could have been (and likely were) made before the U.S. invasion of Iraq.



"Azzam The American" identifies and targets a new enemy

from: Pepe Escobar

Al-Qaeda for its part, with or without a fake, recycled video-only bin Laden, will keep enjoying the fruits of its brand recognition.

Much more than the Middle East, al-Qaeda's special target audience is western Europe, where a legion of "white Moors" - second-generation, radicalized, born-again Muslims - eagerly accepts its new politico-religious anti-imperial message. The best antidote to this expansion would be the dawn of real representative governments in Egypt, Jordan, Syria and the Persian Gulf petro-monarchies. It won't happen - at least not in the near future.

American spy chiefs quickly name Bin Laden's replacement and the replacement quickly identifies the new enemy

from: US loner helps bin Laden to taunt Bush
Tim Shipman in Washington, Sunday Telegraph

American spy chiefs were quick to name Adam Gadahn, the head of al-Qaeda's English language media operations, as the author of large sections of bin Laden's broadcast.

A Californian heavy metal fan, who converted to Islam and became the first American to be charged with treason in half a century, has been fingered as the author of Osama bin Laden's latest video lecture - which left the terror chief sounding like an anti-globalisation protester.

a bizarre rant against America, with references to global warming, "insane taxes", the US mortgage market meltdown and rising interest rates.

What surprised analysts was his use of the language of Left-wing protesters, which showed detailed knowledge of the economic travails of middle America.

Bin Laden referred to "the reeling of many of you under the burden of interest-related debts, insane taxes and real estate mortgage" and blamed "global warming and its woes" on "emissions of the factories the major corporations".

from: KEY QUOTES FROM THE BIN LADEN TRANSCRIPT

EXPANDING THE DEFINITION OF THE ENEMY: HOW TO GO FROM BIN LADEN TO CHAVEZ

• And among the most capable of those from your own side who speak to you on this topic and on the manufacturing of public opinion is Noam Chomsky, who spoke sober words of advice prior to the war,

• to warn against waging the war and describe its true nature in eloquent terms like "no to spilling red blood for black oil,"

• And since the democratic system permits major corporations to back candidates, ... there shouldn't be any cause for astonishment - and there isn't any- in the Democrats' failure to stop the war.

• It has now become clear to you and the entire world the impotence of the democratic system and how it plays with the interests of the peoples and their blood by sacrificing soldiers and populations to achieve the interests of the major corporations...they are the real tyrannical terrorists.

• mankind is in danger because of the global warming ... from the emissions of the factories of the major corporations, ... the White House insists on not observing the Kyoto accord,

• the world is being dominated by the democratic system, which confirms its massive failure to protect humans and their interests from the greed and avarice of the major corporations and their representatives.

• brazen attack on the people, ... Bush, Blair, Sarkozy and Brown- still talk about freedom and human rights with a flagrant disregard for the intellects of human beings. ... you should liberate yourselves from the deception, shackles and attrition of the capitalist system.

• The capitalist system seeks to turn the entire world into a fiefdom of the major corporations under the label of “globalization” in order to protect democracy.

• and the reeling of many of you under the burden of interest-related debts, insane taxes and real estate mortgages; global warming and its woes; ... all of this is but one side of the grim face of this global system.

• So it is imperative that you free yourselves ... and search for an alternative, ... in which it is not the business of any class of humanity to lay down its own laws to its own advantage at the expense of the other classes as is the case with you, since the essence of man-made positive laws is that they serve the interests of those with the capital and thus make the rich richer and the poor poorer.

OH SHIT! ABU, I FORGOT TO TELL YOU....

YOU CANT BE SHAKING HANDS WITH THIS PRICK AND LIVE IN ANBAR. COLLABORATORS EITHER HAVE TO LIVE IN THE FORTIFIED GREEN ZONE OR IN LONDON. PREFERABLY IN LONDON. THAT'S WHERE EVERYONE ELSE IS.

VENEZUELA COMUNITY RADIO: RECLAIM THE MEDIA

Caricuao is one of the outer western parishes of Caracas. As the subway train from the center of Caracas approaches the parish, we pass by precarious ranchos, or flimsy tin and board houses, nestled in the sides of the looming hills and large project-like buildings with bars across the windows. Radio Perola is located on the ground floor of one of these “projects” or popular blocks, known as Canagua. The broadcasting studio is a small room, painted bright yellow and covered with posters from the social justice movement and community radios. On one large corner table there is a mixer, microphone and computer, and at a round table in the center there are several mikes and chairs.

Like other community radio stations in Venezuela, Radio Perola began as a clandestine station nearly nine years ago, and activists have fought for it to be legally authorized by the state. Under the hip-hop inspired slogan, “Maximum Respect!,” community journalists at Radio Perola are creating spaces for new voices, such as those of the young women, to be heard.

a community activist who works with Radio Perola, a Caracas independent radio station that means "Radio Can,"a reference to the string can telephones that many of us know from childhood. In the context of Caracas, where five elite TV stations have long dominated the flow of information, Radio Perola is an example of how the grassroots, in picking up tin can and some string, can take back the media.

Radio Negro Primero, otro Medio Comunitaria de radio. Socios de PCASC, yo tambien, visitaron la estacion en Enero, 2006 cuando 23 personas que viven en Portland asistaron el Foro Social Mundial).

(PHOTO: near Caricuao, Distrito Federal (Venezuela) by Orlando Leiva
See in Google Earth now | Original size)

VENEZUELA MEDIA

The private media has accumulated a large degree of power since the late seventies, due to the growing deregulation and commercialization of media in Venezuela. In 1979, the Venezuelan government sold Channel 5, a state-owned channel, to the private sector. Through the eighties and nineties, successive governments continued the expansion of concessions to media corporations, leading to the centralization of the media in a small number of conglomerates.


Private television at a national level has been monopolized by the Cisneros group (Venevisión) and the 1BC group of Phelps-Granier (Radio Caracas Televisión). Out of 44 regional television networks, nearly all are linked by chain to private networks Venevisión, Radio Caracas Televisión, Televen, and Globovision. This small group of corporations also control radio-electric spaces and the national press.

THE EMPEROR FEARS THE BAGHDAD GREEN ZONE

HE MUST GO TO AL-ASAD AIR BASE IN AL-ANBAR PROVINCE IN THE IRAQI DESERT, MORE THAN 100 MILES WEST OF THE CAPITAL.

Berezovsky wants "orange revolution" money back from Ukraine

14:18 | 03/ 09/ 2007

Print version

KIEV, September 3 (RIA Novosti) - Boris Berezovsky, the fugitive Russian oligarch, is suing Ukrainian politicians for nearly $23 million he says he provided to fund the country's 2004 "orange revolution," Ukrainian justice authorities said Monday.

The London-based businessman, who has a British passport, has filed a suit against Oleksandr Tretyakov and David Zhvaniya, parliamentarians from the pro-presidential Our Ukraine-People's Self-Defense bloc, with the High Court of England and Wales, the Ukrainian Justice Ministry said.

Berezovsky, 61, accused the two politicians, who have been summoned to court September 5 to receive subpoenas, of misusing the money he allocated for what he called the development of democracy.

The "orange revolution" was a popular bloodless uprising in Ukraine that brought pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko to power following a controversial run-off election November 21, 2004, that declared pro-Russian Viktor Yanukovych the victor.

Tretyakov is a former presidential aide, and Zhvaniya was emergencies minister in 2005.

Berezovsky, who is wanted in Russia on charges of fraud and a coup attempt, said he transferred the money to the accounts of Yushchenko's relatives, who have denied the allegations. Berezovsky said he would sue them as well.

BUSH'S NEOCON FRENCH POODLE EXPLAINS GLOBALIZATION

Sarkozy Urges French to Play ‘the Game of Globalization’
By KATRIN BENNHOLD

PARIS, Aug. 30 — In a country that has long resisted globalization, President Nicolas Sarkozy bluntly told France on Thursday to stop kidding itself and face up to it — but in a French way.

• to adopt business-friendly policies to allow French companies to compete better in the world,

• even if the changes upset those clinging to France’s generous welfare system

• (and those clinging to) strong job protection.

But he also echoed themes sounded by predecessors, saying

• but, the free market (is) an illusion

• the government (has to) defend French interests from foreign marauders.

• play the game of globalization collectively,” “

• to defend our interests when all the others are defending theirs?”

he chose the campus of a business school and a business audience to outline his economic program. France’s political class has preferred to be seen with philosophers and intellectuals.

• among the business leaders, ... “he was one of us.”

• Labor unions and leftist opposition politicians, ... appeared to concur. “He is the president of the CAC 40,” said Jean-Luc Mélenchon, a Socialist senator, referring to the French stock market index.

• push for additional cuts in payroll taxes and ways to

• encourage people to work beyond the statutory 35-hour workweek.

• cut the maximum tax burden to 50 percent of personal income and

• scrap taxes on overtime pay.

• changes to the labor code, easing rules that make it cumbersome for companies to fire people.

• to ease the restrictions on firing while still providing some protections for workers.

ARE YOU NOW OR HAVE YOU EVER BEEN A HOMOSEXUAL

"I am not gay, I have never been gay"

WHAT DO THEY WANT?

Can We Win the Ideological War?

by Patrick J. Buchanan


The question arises in the war on terror: we know who the main enemy is, al-Qaeda, the men and movement responsible for 9/11, but what are they fighting for? What is their war all about?

...President Bush, (said)... “The war we fight today is more than a military conflict; it is the decisive ideological struggle of the 21st century. On one side are those who believe in the values of freedom and moderation—the right of all people to speak, and worship, and live in liberty. And on the other side are those driven by the values of tyranny and extremism—the right of a self-appointed few to impose their fanatical views on all the rest.” (the neo-liberals)

In his declaration of war on the United States, bin Laden listed three goals:

1. expel U.S. forces from the sacred soil of Saudi Arabia,
2. stop the persecution of innocent Iraqis through U.S.-UN sanctions, and
3. end the Israeli repression and dispossession of the Palestinian people.

our enemy has captured the flag of nationalism:

• We fight to get your troops off our land!

• We fight to get your hooks out of our government!

• Leave us to rule ourselves!

More importantly, our enemy has rooted his cause in

• a 1,400-year-old religion that has

• 1.2 billion adherents,

• has survived crusades, invasions and occupations, and is

• growing again in militancy and converts

As for the tactics the enemy uses, decent Muslims the world over are said to be growing disgusted with the slaughter by suicide bombers of men, women, and children.

But are these not the tactics the

• French maquis and Italian and Yugoslav partisans used on the Nazis and their collaborators?

• Was this not the way Israelis expelled the British

• the Algerians expelled the French,

• the Afghans expelled the Soviets,

• the ANC overthrew apartheid, and

• Hezbollah drove the IDF out of Lebanon?

Clausewitz would understand: terrorism is the extension of Islamist politics by other means.

what exactly are we fighting for?

we are fighting for the right of Islamic peoples “to speak, and worship, and live in liberty.”

In free elections in Egypt, Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, and Iran, Islamists made gains or racked up victories. In Turkey, a moderate Islamic party just won national power.

It is Western secularism that is in retreat. It is our friends in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Morocco, the Gulf states, and Israel who seem most apprehensive about any more elections among the Arab masses. The Islamists seem to welcome them—and to succeed in them.

A GATED NEOLIBERAL COMMUNITY: YOU CAN HIDE, BUT YOU CANT RUN

In the September/October issue of FP, architectural historian Jane Loeffler—who knows more about U.S. embassy design than just about anybody—gives readers a taste (sub req'd) of just what kind of embassy $1 billion buys these days:

Located in Baghdad’s 4-square-mile Green Zone, the embassy will occupy 104 acres. It will be six times larger than the U.N. complex in New York and more than 10 times the size of the new U.S. Embassy being built in Beijing.... The Baghdad compound will be entirely self-sufficient, with no need to rely on the Iraqis for services of any kind. The embassy has its own electricity plant, fresh water and sewage treatment facilities, storage warehouses, and maintenance shops. The embassy is composed of more than 20 buildings, including six apartment complexes with 619 one-bedroom units. Two office blocks will accommodate about 1,000 employees.... Once inside the compound, Americans will have almost no reason to leave. It will have a shopping market, food court, movie theater, beauty salon, gymnasium, swimming pool, tennis courts, a school, and an American Club for social gatherings."

But what, Loeffler asks, does an embassy this large and this costly say about the nation that built it?

If architecture reflects the society that creates it, the new U.S. embassy in Baghdad makes a devastating comment about America’s global outlook. Although the U.S. government regularly proclaims confidence in Iraq’s democratic future, the United States has designed an embassy that conveys no confidence in Iraqis and little hope for their future. Instead, the United States has built a fortress capable of sustaining a massive, long-term presence in the face of continued violence."

DOSSIER CLOSED

TEHRAN, August 28 (RIA Novosti)

• "I am officially declaring that the Iranian 'nuclear dossier' is, from our point of view, closed," Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said.

• He added that President Vladimir Putin assured him at a recent meeting of the Shanghai security organization that the Bushehr facility being built by Russia will be completed as contracted.

• He said that despite repeated threats from Washington, U.S. forces are over-stretched and the country's political will flagging, making an attack unlikely.

"Washington's threats of a military solution [of the Iranian nuclear question] are largely propaganda," he said.

"All of Iran's nuclear activities conform to norms set by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and international legal standards," he said. "Iran seeks nothing more than its due under international law."

He repeated Iran's long-standing position that Tehran does not seek nuclear weapons, despite Western suspicions.

The UN nuclear watchdog corroborated the Iranian announcement, stating on its Web site Tuesday that it was satisfied with Iran's compliance.

The document, entitled "Understandings of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the IAEA on the Modalities of Resolution of the Outstanding Issues," said that during a meeting in Iran with IAEA representatives, "Iran provided clarifications to the agency that helped to explain the remaining questions."

PUTIN PREPARES FOR CIA DESIGNER PURPLE FINGER CRUSADES

... subtle measures being instituted by the Putin regime to enhance national - and, even more, nationalist - pride.

Two examples: the creation of a patriotic youth movement, and the not-too-subtle rewriting of Russia's school history books. The youth movement called "Nashi" (it translates as "ours") is growing fast, encouraged by government ... to buttress Putin's regime against domestic critics.

The policies that Nashi advocates are eclectic. ... and a detestation of foreigners; ... who threaten the Russian way of life.

Right now, Nashi is training tens of thousands of young diligents; .. they ... discuss "proper" and "corrupt" politics, and receive the necessary education for the struggles to come. ... Nashi is training 60,000 "leaders" to monitor voting and conduct exit polls in elections this coming December and March.

a new manual for high school history teachers that seeks to instill a renewed pride in teenagers of their country's past and encourage national solidarity.

... teaches that "entry into the club of democratic nations involves surrendering part of your national sovereignty to the U.S."

Turkmenistan

STRATFOR

the National Security Council has instead named Deputy Prime Minister Gurbanguly Berdimukhammedov interim president.

home of the world's fifth-largest natural gas supply. Currently, its existing infrastructure is Soviet-era and creaking and it sends nearly all of its natural gas exports -- about 67 billion cubic meters per year -- north and west to Russia. Without those shipments, Russian state energy firm Gazprom would find it impossible to both satisfy domestic Russian natural gas demand and fulfill its export contracts with Europe and Turkey.

Turkmenistan's natural gas fields -- the ones that are currently being exploited and those that have never been touched -- are often pointed to as sources for potential energy infrastructure projects that could send natural gas to South Asia via Afghanistan, or to Europe via a sub-sea Caspian pipeline.

Russia must have Turkmen natural gas to keep its policy of using energy as a foreign policy hammer going; replacing Turkmen supplies would take a decade and tens of billions of dollars in cash that Gazprom simply does not have. This policy is the foundation of Russia's grand strategy, and there is little Moscow would not do to ensure that it gets its way.

For Iran, Historically, invasions of Persia have come from two directions: west and north. Iranian policy vis-à-vis Iraq to the west has masterminded events to turn Iraq into a quagmire for the United States. To secure its north, the majority of Turkmenistan's 5 million people live within a few miles of the Iranian border. An invasion would be logistically simple, strategically sound and impossible for any power to counter.

The United States has a handful of troops outside of Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, about 1,000 miles away, and its forces in Afghanistan cannot even think of being redeployed. It has tried to secure base rights in Turkmenistan to support its Afghan operations only to be rebuffed by Niyazov himself.

For the past two years, the geopolitical strategies of these two countries -- to tie down the Americans -- have been relatively in sync. But now there is a prize that both desperately want, and one that cannot be easily shared.

Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, Tajik President Emomali Rakhmonov and Uzbek President Islam Karimov -- are all de facto despots who have gutted the opposition and, as of yet, have not fashioned a clear line of succession. The battle to follow Niyazov's death is just the beginning.

THE PURPLE FLYING FICKLE FINGER OF DEMOCRACY

I'm talking, of course about Ayad Allawi, longtime C.I.A. asset and former interim prime minister of Iraq. He's making quite the PR push to get his old job back, penning an op-ed for the Washington Post, hooking up with Wolf Blitzer on Late Edition on Sunday, and even putting the high-powered GOP lobbying firm Barbour Griffith & Rogers on a $300,000 retainer.

It says everything you need to know about who the true power holders in Iraq are that Allawi, who has a "six-point plan" for Iraq that involves replacing the current Prime Minister, is campaigning in Washington -- not Baghdad. He clearly knows that despite Bush's bathetic paeans to Iraqi sovereignty, the real deciders in Iraq are not the Iraqi people, but a few dozen folks in the White House and the Pentagon. They are Allawi's true constituency.

Could the White House be seeing in the blame-Maliki-for-the-disaster-in-Iraq meme an opportunity replace the sputtering "give the surge a chance" plan with a "give Allawi a chance" plan?

• "six points call for a full partnership with the United States"

• "objective is to develop a plan to save Iraq and to save American lives,

• of course, Iraqi lives, and

• to save the American mission in Iraq."

• "If we talk around the region of two to two-and-a-half years," "I think we are in the right direction."

• Who needs Petraeus when the Allawi coup can buy them another two-and-a-half years?

• -- he's already memorized the playbook.

• "As soon as the Iraqi forces are able to stand on their feet and provide security for the Iraqis I think the draw-down should start."

who is paying for the $300,000 Barbour Griffith & Rogers lobbying contract, Allawi wouldn't say

TURKMENISTAN GAS TO CHINA

Second West-East Pipeline Project had been approved by the Chinese government, and that CNPC would be the sole investor.

to go on-stream in 2010. Construction will start in 2008

the Second West-East Pipeline will start at Horgas in Xinjiang and end at Guangzhou in the south and Shanghai in the east

The pipeline will pump natural gas from Central Asia, mainly from gas-rich Turkmenistan.

Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov.. CNPC and Turkmenistan's national gas company Turkmengaz signed a purchase and sale agreement on natural gas supplies.

Under the deal, the ex-Soviet country will supply 30 billion cubic meters of gas to China annually.

FROM MANUEL GARCIA

the public is basically irrational. It is ultimately pointless to worry about Bush and global warming and fascism and the rest, because they will always win. It has to be this way, because people are fully in the grip of fantasies they would rather die to preserve than become aware of factual reality. Those who do have some sense use it to manipulate the public mind for the benefit of the exploitative systems. We are doomed.

I could make a lot more money writing ju-ju channeling flak for some neo-con outfit -- but I hate those kind of people. Still, they'll win, because ju-ju is better than sex. Global warming?, no problem, buy coal-burning SUVs to extinction; loss of Constitutional rights?, no problem we're beating Islamofascism; no health insurance?, no problem, ESPN [sports] on plasma TVs is getting cheaper; no education? no problem, it's free from the Army; it all doesn't make sense? no problem, embrace the ju-ju!