ANDY MARTIN
The Right Republican for
U. S. Senator from Illinois/2008
Suite 4406, 30 E. Huron Street
Chicago, IL 60611-4723
Toll-free tel. (866) 706-2639
Toll-free fax (866) 707-2639
Web site: www.AndyforUSSenator.com
E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com


January 29, 2007

Hon. Roberto Gonzales
Attorney General
U. S. Department of
Justice
Washington, DC 20530


Re: Hostage taking of Sami Al-Arian by USDOJ


Dear General Gonzales:

I am a Republican candidate for the United States Senate and I am very proud to run on the Republican ticket. Nevertheless, I believe the policy of DOJ towards the Palestinian national movement is self-destructive and counterproductive to the foreign policy interests of the United States.

I am therefore writing to ask that you direct that Sami Al-Arian, who is essentially a hostage and political prisoner of DOJ, be freed forthwith. I would prefer that he be allowed to remain and live in the United States with his family.

1. The Palestinian national movement and DOJ

Regrettably, due to supporters of Israel within the United States, DOJ has been used as a bludgeon to criminalize and destroy the Palestinian national movement ("PNM") here at home. The results are evident to anyone: Palestinian nationalism is stronger today than at any time in the past. The United States' Middle East standing has never been lower. Israel has never been more endangered. To quote Pogo, "We have met the enemy, and he is us." America has steadfastly been its own worst enemy in the Middle East.

Criminal prosecution is an entirely inappropriate vehicle for supporting Israel. In Palestine, Israelis are not the victims; they are aggressors who have carried on a brutal occupation for forty years.

And yes, as a result of the occupation and Israeli state terrorism, Palestinians have responded in kind. Members of both sides are killing each other, although Israelis have killed many more Palestinians than vice versa. I guess some Israelis in their military junta of a government think that if they commit enough atrocities the Arab population will give up and go away. That’s what a racist Israeli government official proposed on his recent visit to Washington.

I don't expect either side to leave.

I fail to see why the United States should subscribe to, endorse or otherwise aid and abet in this Israeli insanity. If Israleis really wanted peace they would free prisoners, open borders and take risks for peace, not claim they are trying to avoid risks for peace.

Peace is a risky process and making peace will be a difficult business, as we are painfully learning in Iraq.

2. DOJ's prosecution fiasco in Tampa

During the Al-Arian trial I wrote columns predicting Sami would be found not guilty, and stating that he was, and is, "my friend." I have not met Sami but he was a guest on my talk radio show Andy Martin's America (not currently on the air). The Al-Arian trial was a political circus and even in "conservative" Tampa the prosecution backfired and embarrassed DOJ at home and the United States abroad.

Using every dirty trick in the book, as overzealous prosecutors have been known to do, DOJ was unable to convict Al-Arian, and then made a deal to release him at a defined date. DOJ has now broken its promise. Using civil contempt as a tool to harass people and to avoid agreements entered into in good faith besmirches DOJ.

3. The real war against terror

Almost every American supports the war against terror, and realizes that we do have violent psychopaths who want to do us harm. I was in New York on 9/11/01 and I know the consequences. We should focus on our real enemies, such as Al Qaeda, and not seek to demonize our natural allies, such as the Palestinians.

I have reported from and analyzed the Middle East for 37 years and before me my British family roots in the region go back over 100 years. In short, I have some basis to express informed opinions.

It is a mockery of international intelligence for Secretary of State Rice to flit around saying she wants to "discuss" peace when the parameters of Palestinian/Israeli peace have always been known. In 2000, I advocated the Andy Martin Peace Plan," which can be retrieved from PRNewswire. If only President Bush would read and listen.

Moreover it is apodictic that "peace" will not automatically and immediately lead to "peace" and nonviolence. Radial rejectionists on both sides will seek to sabotage efforts towards peace that are supported by the vast majority for Palestinians and Israelis. So any peace process must recognize that violence will endure, even after peace. That is why former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's demands that violence end before he would discuss peace were a sham and charade.

4. Why multiply failures with more failures?

DOJ failed in prosecuting Sami Al-Arian, and you have failed to win the worldwide battle for public opinion. The world knows that Israelis occupy Palestinians, not vice versa. It is U. S. cluster bomb units, paid for with American tax dollars, that were used to massacre innocent Lebanese last year. And it was ridiculous when Condi Rice went to Lebanon to express crocodile tears for what our Israeli puppets had done. America has a positive role to play in the Middle East. But in seeking to brand the PNM as a criminal organization the United States detracts from that role. DOJ's approach has not succeeded and it will not succeed.

5. Offer to serve as a hostage in Al-Arian's place

If you want to hostage, so that militant pro-Israelis will be able to pretend that they are accomplishing something by corrupting the administration of justice I offer to stand/sit in Mr. Al-Arian's cell. Throughout history, down to the recent freedom of Nelson Mandela, criminalization of national independence movements has failed abysmally. So I offer to sit in Sami's stead as a hostage to the PNM. My incarceration would be as useless as his, and my unjust imprisonment as a hostage to pro-Israel prosecutors would be just as much of an embarrassment to the United States. But at least it would be clear that DOJ is corrupting the grand jury process and engaging in political theater, not legitimate prosecution.

If you love your country, as I know you do, and as I do, it is time to end the insanity of criminalizing the PNM, and to free Palestinians being held both by Israel and the United States. Welcome, don’t imprison, them.

In time, Israelis will discover or admit that "peace" is a two-sided exchange, not a one-sided demand for capitulation by the opposition.

We can and should work for peace in the Middle East. You could strike a strong blow for peace by apologizing to Mr. Al-Arian and inviting him to remain in the United States. I think the risk is well worth it. Ironically, it has been my experience that most Israelis would be able to make peace with Palestinians if only the extremist outsiders stopped goading on militant elements inside the region. You have the power to free Sami. Just do it.

Please feel free to call if you have any questions.



Respectfully submitted,





ANDY MARTIN
REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE FOR
UNITED STATES SENATOR

AM:sp

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 25, 2007
INSIDE THE BUSH WHITE HOUSE, PART TWO: HOW BUSH CAN WIN THE WAR IN IRAQ AND DEFEAT THE DEMOCRATS
THE “KABUKI ARMY” ON CAPITOL HILL MAY YET SAVE GEORGE BUSH IN BAGHDAD
(CHICAGO)(January 25, 2007) The Republican Party Army of the Potomac is dispirited and demoralized. There are murmurs of rebellion in the ranks. Washington has just fallen to the Democratic Party Army. Is there no hope? Well, yes, there is.
In politics, it pays to be lucky. Just ask Barack Obama. And George Bush. Both men went from obscurity to national office due to happenstance and sheer luck. But they made it.
And Bush may be on the verge of becoming lucky again. Only this time he will have to make his own luck, not inherit it.
Republicans are trembling at the imminent passage of the “non-binding resolution” decrying Bush’s “surge” in Baghdad. Georgie, you’re a lucky boy.
The Democratic Party Army is inexorably morphing into the Kabuki Army. If you feel “Kabuki” is too stereotyping a term, please substitute the “Alphone and Gaston Army.”
Why is Bush lucky? Because if he has to have an adversary on Capitol Hill, the Kabuki Army is the best adversary possible.
“Cognitive dissonance” is the condition where someone believes one thing and does another. We might also call this the Cognitive Dissonance Congress. Or the Contradiction Congress.
Senator James Webb went on TV to rebut Bush’s state of the nation and said “If Bush doesn’t do it, we will.” Well.
Congress indeed has the power to “do it,” by law. But no one is expecting imminent passage of a law to order the troops withdrawn or to suspend funding for their mission as part of the withdrawal process. Instead, Democrats are trying to have it both ways, trying to claim a belief in the wrongness of the surge while taking limp-wristed steps to stop the same program. (This reminds me of Barack Obama's religious beliefs, but I won't go there today.)
Is it any wonder this weekend we are likely to see the left protesting in Washington? Against the Democrats?
We all know politicians are hypocrites. But the Kabuki Congress is taking duplicity to new levels of artistic performance. Like a carefully choreographed Kabuki dance, Democrats are simultaneously mouthing “support for the troops” and opposition, though a “non-binding opposition,” for the policy the troops are there to enforce.
The U. S. senate is confirming a new commander in Baghdad, and promoting him to four stars, while telling the good General David Petraeus that his mission is malarkey. Talk about support. And cognitive dissonance.
I feel the Democrats are about to “swift boat” themselves. And they don’t even know it. Talk about repeating the past.
If Bushie came to me (and he hasn’t called yet) I would say, “Bushie (no obsequious “Mr. President” for me), give’em hell.” Do a Truman. Attack, attack, attack. Point out the gross inconsistency and world-class hypocrisy in praising a general and condemning his mission, in saying the mission is wrong but not having the guts to stop it.
Luckily, our men and women in Iraq have more guts and, one hopes, more brains that their Kabuki Army detractors in Congress.
As Joan Rivers would say, Bushie, “Can we talk?”
I marched against the invasion of Iraq in Washington on January 18, 2003. I marched in New York. I couldn't believe Bush would be stupid enough to invade. I couldn’t believe Powell would believe the nonsense he was being spoon fed. I couldn’t, I couldn’t, I couldn’t. But they did. And I ended up in Baghdad a few days after Saddam went undercover.
I preached from the minarets: this is wrong, and going wrong. And getting worse. I exposed corruption and incompetence. My payback: Bushie and Bremer trashed me while lifting weights together in the White House. Bremer got my award. Life’s not fair.
So why am I now predicting Bush could win his war against the Kabuki Army? Have I switched sides? Not really. We call’em the way we see’em. And right now the Kabuki Democrats (not to be confused with the Atari Democrats) look primed for a big fall--if only Bush will seize the initiative and become a bold leader.
We were reminded a few days ago that our late President Ford once said, “I’m a Ford, not a Lincoln.” It is time for a President who is a Lincoln. I come from the Land of Lincoln. I know. Just ask me.
How does Bush counterattack and defeat the Kabukis on Capitol Hill? First, just keep telling the people the truth.
Bushie, I know it’s painful. But just keep saying “I got bad advice.” Everyone will believe you because no one thinks you know anything about foreign affairs. Just say “We made mistakes. Big mistakes.” Mean it.
But then say “What the Kabuki Democrats are doing is a disgrace to America. We can and will get it right.”
And remember, you live in an American Idol era. Be entertaining, be forceful, be dramatic and most of all be persistent and repetitive. My professor in undergraduate school who got me started in politics, Louis Volpp, used to say “There is no repetition for undergraduates.” And there is no repetition for Americans. We have a short attention span. We want instant gratification. And we are lazy. We want it bite-sized and digestible. We have the attention span of (insert choice, but please abuse no animals). So say it over and over again.
Tell the people what another great American statesman (who shall remain anonymous in the interests of computer decency laws) once said: “Help is on the way.” Tell’em “I will not abandon General Petraeus and neither should the American people.” Over and over again.
Why do I feel for Bushie? Because I have always liked the man, even on my talk radio program, while I hated and condemned his policies. And, in the hour of danger and disaster, I will not abandon my president. Bushie, invite me to the White House and I will give you a big, fat kick in the butt, and say ”Just do it.” And, “Be a Lincoln.”
Yes, we are in a big, big mess in Baghdad and Iraq. But the realty is that we are stuck there. The mendacious Kabuki Democrats realize that. Which is why their calls for withdrawal are always hedged with more weasel words than a Wall Street lawyer’s, such as “not precipitously” or “phased?”
Bushie, here’s how you win:
1. Attack the Kabuki Democrats as I have just stated.
2. Put an end to Palestinian/Israeli bickering and adopt the Andy Martin Peace Plan, which I first announced in 2000. Just do it. Officially recognize the State of Palestine as encompassing the 1967 borders, and send an Arabic-speaking Foreign Service Officer as ambassador to Abu Mazen, to be accredited in Jerusalem. Next week. Within hours, you will be a hero in the Arab world. “Abu Bush” will be the new caliph. We will have moved from “Help is on the way” to “Help has arrived” using the awesome powers of our Constitution. Within hours.
3. Go to Baghdad. Again. Only this time no phony turkeys and posed shots. Do a “President Reagan-at-the- Brandenburg Gate” (“Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall”) and tell the Iraqi people we have made mistakes and we will help them to recover. Be humble. Do it in person, and be sincere and at risk. You need to leave the Green Zone. (Visit my old apartment in Baghdad.) More hurrahs from the Arab world.
4. Recognize that the war you are fighting, that you hideously brought on yourself, will not be won at “Fort Apache The White House.” It will be won on the streets of the Middle East. Period. No exceptions. Be there.
5. Finally, send Vice President Cheney to an undisclosed location and lock him in a closet. The man does not help the cause. He is a hopelessly counterproductive supporter.
You can’t win the war militarily, but with the surge and bold, decisive political actions in the Middle East you can reverse field and win the war psychologically.
Then bring our fighting men and women home and hug all of them from me and from every American. We love’em.
Now about that medal you gave Bremer, Bushie.
Editorial note: Inside the Bush White House, Part Two: The Saudi Connection, was scheduled for today; that has been rescheduled for tomorrow as Inside the Bush White House, Part Three.
________________________________________________
Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national and world politics with forty years of personal experience; he is America’s most respected independent foreign policy, military and intelligence analyst. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com; contrariancommentary.blogspot.com; contrariancommentary.wordpress.com. Web sites: AndyMartin.com, AndyforUSSenator.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 25, 2007

OBAMA “SWIFT BOATS” THE TRUTH TO HIDE HIS RELIGIOUS HISTORY

BARACK GRADUALLY AND GRUDGINGLY ADMITS TO LITTLE FACTS WHILE STILL DENYING THE LARGER REALITY

ANDY MARTIN ONCE AGAIN PUNCTURES “THE AUDACITY OF OBAMA”

(CHICAGO)(January 25, 2007) “Swift boating” is a term that came into use during the 2004 presidential election to reflect Senator John Kerry’s flaccid response to attacks on his wartime record in Viet-Nam. The term, a noun, adjective and verb, has entered the political lexicon and is usually invoked when liberals and Democrats are stung trying to defend themselves against unpleasantly truthful accusations hurled by conservatives.

Well, “swift boating” is obviously a two-way street in politics. Democrats are equally adept at hurling painful accusations at Republicans and conservatives.

I have no problem with people bringing the truth to light, digging up unpleasant facts and seeking to raise legitimate issues. For the record, ContrarianCommentary.com has never “swift boated” anyone. Our mantra is: “Just the facts, mam’m.”

Well, what are the facts? When you penetrate Obama’s smokescreen you see that he is completely paranoid about investigation and accusations concerning his religious past.

Obama lined up a gaggle of trained geese yesterday, portraying them as “religious leaders.” They promptly condemned any investigation into Barry’s religion as “despicable,” a violation of “values,” “moral standards” and “malicious.” The “religious leaders” said they were “set[ting] the record straight,” but then admitted they accepted Obama’s version of the record “at face value.” No inquiry or investigation there. Trained parrots would have been more communicative than Obama’s geese.

Two and a half years ago we reported that Obama had been a Muslim and that his family was Muslim. Today Obama admitted as much while still trying to deny the same truth. If Jack Ryan had been as slick as Obama at hiding in plain sight, Ryan and not Obama would be in the senate today.

Obama’s parents registered him as a Muslim at a Catholic school.

It is absolutely true that Obama did not “choose” to be a Muslim when he registered as such at a Catholic school. Parents make those choices for their children. But those decisions nonetheless reflect family facts and practical reality. Parental choices also have developmental significance.

Obama later transferred from a Catholic school, where by his own admission yesterday he studied the “catechism,” to an exclusive public school where the children of Indonesian leaders were enrolled and where he began to study Islam as a mandated part of his instruction. Free will? No. Fact? Absolutely.

All of these small truths were admitted yesterday by Obama and his communications meister Robert Gibbs. Contrary to what Obama claims are “scurrilous” accusations, he has confessed to the core of the Insight article and my own seminal research 2-1/2 years ago on which all subsequent articles about Obama have been based. Even Hillary Clinton began with my research. No surprise; because I was right.

Notably absent from yesterday’s dog and pony show on Obama’s religion was any mention of his quickly forgotten father and grandfather, both of whom were lifelong Muslims and both of whom named their sons Hussein, a very honorable Muslim tradition.

The bottom line: all of the factual material I disclosed in 2004 has been proven 100% correct, grudgingly and gradually admitted, or silently conceded by Obama and his staff.

But ultimately what interests me about Obama is not his religion or lack thereof. I could care less. Rather I am drawn by the fact that Barack continues to fictionalize large portions of his life, including his religious history, and steadfastly denies reality. No man with such a rich fantasy existence can be trusted in the Oval Office.

My political affiliation is not a secret. I am a Republican and generally conservative to libertarian on governmental issues while liberal on social issues. As the late Governor Adlai Stevenson would have put it, “I’ll stay out of your bedroom if you stay out of mine.” And my research manages to offend almost all shades of the political spectrum. I drive both “conservatives” and “liberals” batty. Read my past columns and decide for yourself.

In 2003 in Baghdad I performed similar psycho-surgery on Paul Bremer. He didn’t like it either. Nor did George Bush. They attacked me. But I was right and they were wrong. As a result, I probably get more than my fair share of hate mail.

Nevertheless, while my opinions and conclusions are clearly my own, as an Internet editor and investigative journalist I adhere scrupulously and impartially to the facts I unearth. And, yes, small facts can be assembled to disclose larger truths. I have been doing that all of my life.

In the case of Obama, conservatives and even liberals fail to see the critical trees for the mesmerizing enchanted forest Obama he presents as his persona: way into adulthood Barack maintained a rich fantasy life about his past, and he continued to do so when he wrote his first book, fictionalizing characters and dialog. Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times castigated him for these fabrications in a review dated August 8, 2004.

As a psychoanalytic case study, I believe Obama will prove to be a basket case. But because of the therapeutic culture in which we live, the media and public are willing to ignore Obama’s dysfunctional reality in preference to his fictionalization about his history and himself. Inconvenient facts that intrude on Obama’s fantasy life are summarily erased (Father and Grandfather Muslims? Nope. Name Hussein? So what. White relatives? “Book’em Danno.” And so forth).

Investigative journalism is still about investigation; people such as Obama do not like to be either investigated or analyzed. That is why the “religious leaders” presenting themselves as Dancing Bears for Barack are apologists for his “ask no questions” approach to research and analysis concerning his background. (Their letter can be found at the New York Times blog “The Caucus.”) What will Mr. Obama place off limits next?

Yes, there is “swift boating” going on here. But the swift boats have been launched by Obama to torpedo the truth about his past.

There is much, much more to Obama’s fantasy life. As Barack struggles to place his lies about religion in a concrete crypt he opens himself to accusations concerning other fabrications and fantasies in his life. During Obama Week leading up to February 10th, we will release our CIA-style psychological profile on him; that analysis will cast more light on Barack’s supple psyche and his ability to seamlessly deny objective reality.

In the words of the Psychoed by Hughes Mearns, “As I was going up the stair, I met a man who wasn’t there. He wasn’t there again today. I wish. I wish he’d stay away. Mr. Obama is both the man going up the stair and the man who isn’t there. Obama wishes the real Obama would disappear so the fictional fantasy Obama can prevail. But that will not happen. Barry keeps seeing himself on the stair. And he doesn’t like what he sees.

Or, if you prefer to move from psychology to boxing, as Joe Louis might have put it, “Obama can run, but he can’t hide.”

Stay tuned. Obama Week is only a few days away.

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Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national and world politics with forty years of personal experience. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com; ContrarianCommentary.blogspot.com; contrariancommentary.wordpress.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639.

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 24, 2007

IS “MADRASSAGATE” REALLY OVER?

MAYBE NOT

MEDIA TRY TO BURY LEGITIMATE QUESTIONS ABOUT BARACK OBAMA’S PAST

(CHICAGO)(January 24, 2007) Chicago Sun-Times columnist Lynn Sweet politely attempted to end “Madrassagate” with a column yesterday entitled “Barack Attack Unfounded.” Sweet’s column can be combined with Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg’s attacks on “crazies” who question Obama, a man who is “so appealing to Americans who are not nuts.”

Well, is “Madrassagate” really over? No, not really.

First, the Roman Catholic Church used to have an expression, “Give us a boy until the age of 7 and we have him for life.” Childhood impressions and experiences are really important, notwithstanding attempts to suggest Obama was “only 6 years old” when he lived in Jakarta. It was still a highly impressionable age in a very unusual environment.

Second, Obama’s past is of particular interest because he has fantasized about and fabricated portions of the “facts” about his early years. It is entirely fair to say that if he distorted or concocted some parts of his autobiography in “Dreams From My Father,” he may have concocted others.

Third, CNN is hardly an independent news source for many Americans. I know, CNN likes to bash Fox news, and Fox likes to bash CNN, but the reality is that supporters of each cable channel do not trust information from the other.

Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post appeared on CNN and sought to debunk the Madrassagate story as conservative nonsense. Kurtz complained about the lack of footnotes (attributions) in an article discussing Obama’s madrassa experience.

CNN’s report on Obama’s alleged madrassa years sought to extrapolate backwards, from 2007 back to 1967. It is reasonable to ask what the school was like when Obama was there, not what it is like today. CNN, moreover, added another piece to the puzzle when it disclosed that Obama went to school in a ritzy neighborhood, down the street from the U. S. Ambassador’s residence. Perhaps that is why ordinary African-Americans have never cottoned to Obama’s pretenses of street smarts. They know he’s not one of them, not genuine.

Obama, indeed, with his foreign background, is the John Kerry of the 2008 election. Both men were formed in the rarified environment of privilege and overseas influence.

Jakarta is a critical place for another reason: Obama was separated from his mother at age 10, and left Jakarta never to reside with her again. He was raised thereafter in a life of academic privilege and possibly emotional hunger, by his working class grandparents in Hawaii. Thus, Obama’s years in Indonesia were extremely formative for him. It is impossible to comprehend the man today without understanding the feelings and experiences he had while living in Jakarta. Any psychologist could tell you that. Just ask.

Sweet/Steinberg attempt to suggest Obama is being “Swift Boated” by “right-wing” columnists. I have no idea what Hillary Clinton is doing with her campaign for president but I would be very surprised if her minions have not conducted some basic background research on Obama, and checked out the Jakarta years. I am also convinced that Jakarta is one of the keys to unlocking Obama’s personality and psyche. As for myself, I hardly qualify as “right-wing” in the eyes of real right wingers; they call me pro-Muslim. But I just try to write accurate commentary.

“Swift boating” attempts to distort the facts. Legitimate research seeks to uncover the facts, and to connect them into a coherent pattern. Sometimes research leads somewhere, sometimes nowhere; that doesn’t make it evil or mean-spirited. Since Obama is a modern-day Chauncey Gardner, in the vacuousness of his comments on current affairs, knowing more about his past is extremely helpful.

My guess is that we have not heard the last of Obama’s “madrassa” years. Based on my own research, there is potentially more to come. People ignored my initial Obama disclosures in 2004; that research finally came to fruition in 2006. We are still looking. For facts. I am not a swift boat mariner.

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Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national and world politics with forty years of personal experience. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com; ContrarianCommentary.blogspot.com; contrariancommentary.wordpress.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639.

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 23, 2007

"I TOLD YOU SO," PART FOUR:

“THE MAN WHO BROUGHT DOWN BARRACK OBAMA”

MADRASSA MADNESS EXPLODES, BUT CNN WON’T PUT OUT THE FIRES

[Editor's note: With "I told you so," Part One, Andy initiated a beginning-of-the-year series of comments on some of his columns, predictions and projections that have stood the test of time and continue to generate intense public interest.]

(CHICAGO)(January 23, 2007) Two and a half years ago, in August 2004, I held news conferences in London and New York to expose Barack Obama as a complete fraud. My news release is posted on the web, http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1189687/posts, so there is no doubting the date or authenticity or content of our original research.

Since then, all opposition research on Obama has relied on our seminal work from the London Bureau, working through our special contacts in the Foreign and Commonwealth office for Kenya analysis and Chicago headquarters for political insight.

ArchPundit.com, a site that identifies itself as “the best blogger on the Illinois political scene,” now states that "Andy Martin is the guy who seems to have gotten all this started.” I should point out that ArchPundit.com is no friend of mine and gives credit only grudgingly and venomously.

When the history of the Obama fall-from-media-grace is written, our columns will have been the fuse that exploded the Obama myth and stripped the mask off Barack’s face.

Chicago Sun-Times columnist Neil Steinberg [http://www.suntimes.com/news/steinberg/221436,CST-NWS-stein21.article] refers to some of Obama’s opponents as “crazies” and “nuts” who live in an “intellectual wasteland.”

I can’t speak for other writers and other groups, but for myself I just write the news as I see it. At ContrarianCommentary.com we go where other media are too lazy or incompetent to tread, perhaps including Mr. Steinberg.

We broke the original Obama stories in 2004 because we conducted the international investigative reporting concerning Obama’s invented family history that Chicago newspapers had failed to perform. We did the same from Baghdad beginning in 2003; those columns were the first to predict the chaos and collapse of Paul Bremer and the Coalition Provisional Authority; many can still be found on the web. It is an enviable track record of impartial accuracy and unerring analysis.

I don’t bear Obama any animus as a person or as a politician, any more than I take media criticism of myself personally. Neither Mr. Steinberg nor ArchPundit are drinking buddies on Friday afternoons.

Nevertheless, while people are entitled to their own opinions, they are not entitled to their own facts. We deal in facts and even those who disagree with us can’t dislodge our facts. So let it be with Obama.

So, as ArchPundit states: “Andy Martin is the guy who seems to have gotten this [Obama controversy} all started.” Well.

REQUEST FOR ASSISTANCE: Does anyone have a copy of Lynn Sweet’s Chicago Sun-Times article on Obama’s book on August 8, 2004 available to send me? I would appreciate a copy as I have misplaced my own and I can’t find it on the web.

TOMORROW: MORE analysis on Obama and why he should not be president.

CNN claims it has extinguished the “Madrassa Madness” about Obama with a report from Jakarta supposedly exploding the myths about his Indonesian education, but don’t bet on it. We will have more to say, of course. (Question for Barry: Do you still speak Bahasa?)

COMING: a CIA-style psychological profile of Barack (Barry) Obama.

And thank you ArchPundit for stating the truth. We have “gotten this all started” and we will keep adding fuel to the fire. Keep reading the controversial truth, only at ContrarianCommentary.com. “Just the facts, mam’m.”

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Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national and world politics with forty years of personal experience. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com; ContrarianCommentary.blogspot.com; contrariancommentary.wordpress.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639.

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 21, 2007

"I TOLD YOU SO," PART THREE: BARACK OBAMA

MADRASSA MANIA KO'S OBAMA

CONTRARIANCOMMENTARY.COM READIES "PSYCHOLOGICAL PROFILE" ON OBAMA

HAWAII, INDONESIA NEXT ON CC'S INVESTIGATIVE AGENDA

[Editor's note: With "I told you so," Part One, Andy initiated a beginning-of-the-year series of comments on some of his columns, predictions and projections that have stood the test of time and continue to generate intense public interest.]

(CHICAGO)(January 21, 2007) Two and a half years ago, in August 2004, I held news conferences in London and New York to expose Barack Obama as a complete fraud. My news release is posted on the web, http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1189687/posts, so there is no doubting the date or authenticity or content of our research.

Since then, all opposition research on Obama has relied on our seminal work from the London Bureau, working through our unique contacts in the Foreign and Commonwealth office.

Insight Magazine has now caught up with our research and writing and added a few additional embellishments. The New York Post reports "Madrassa Madness" has finally hit Obama. His national aspirations will ultimately be determined by the questions raised about his relationship to the Muslim religion.

Once again, "I told you so." Two and a half years ago.

ContrarianCommentary.com is preparing a CIA-style psychological profile on Obama to be released during our exclusive "Obama Week," February 5-10. I will probably be turning up in Hawaii before then, or soon after.

Two and a half years ago I identified the underlying issues that will lead to Obama's downfall: concealment and fabrication. He conceals material facts, and he fabricates material facts, about himself and his family.

A Chicago blogger who has an intense dislike for me, Tom Roeser, has also been questioning Obama's religion. The issue won’t disappear. To paraphrase Watergate, "It's not Obama's religion that is the issue, it's the cover-up of his religious background." The same applies to Obama's Soviet Union-style attempts to erase his white relatives from pubic view.

While Tom Roeser and I may personally disagree, I find his work on Obama quite provocative. Roeser makes the point that Obama was schooled in the most violent and militant sect of Islam, the Wahabi branch that spawned the 9/11 hijackers/murderers and continues to energize insurgents in Iraq. If Obama was ever a Wahabi, or schooled in a Wahabi institution, Americans will demand answers. He can’t remain a tabula rasa forever. Given Obama's putative Wahabi background, how he would deal with Iraq becomes an issue of potentially explosive public concern and intense conflict for him.

Contrarian Commentary also has people looking in Indonesia. The truth will come out, sooner rather than later.

Obama's religion will continue to draw attention, just as the absence of his white relatives who are seemingly locked in a basement, will also become of increasing interest. The fact that Obama is embarrassed by his white relatives, and keeps them under wraps, is highly psychologically significant.

Obama, moreover, says he is a Christian. Based on his family history he is a convert. When did he convert? When was he baptized? By whom? What baptismal records exist? People have a right to probe deeply into these issues not because they would normally be relevant but because of Obama's blank slate and his attempt to cover up his racial and religious history.

And, once again, mainstream media are rushing to catch up with Contrarian Commentary. Our CIA-style profile of Obama will open to the world a picture of a deeply disturbed, as well as highly intelligent and highly charismatic, human being, who has no business being seriously considered for the White House.

I told you so in 2004, and I will keep telling you so.

------------------------------------------Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national and world politics with forty years of personal experience. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com; ContrarianCommentary.blogspot.com; contrariancommentary.wordpress.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639.

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 18, 2007
THE DAY THE UNITED STATES STOPPED BEING A SUPERPOWER WHILE GEORGE BUSH WAS CHASING IMAGINARY WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION IN IRAQ, CHINA WAS CREATING REAL WEPAONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION IN SPACE
(CHICAGO)(January 15, 2007) During the 1800's Great Britain and the Royal Navy enjoyed unquestioned supremacy across the world's seas. That supremacy ended in 1914. Without unquestioned naval power the British Empire gradually began to dissolve. Within a few decades the empire had evaporated.
Last week the United States stopped being "the world's only superpower." A tiny Chinese rocket fired at an invisible satellite exploded the myth of our continuing military supremacy.
Being a superpower involves controlling with unquestioned authority all areas of critical world conflict. Whether on the open seas during the British era, or in the air during America's age of hegemony, superpower status must be constantly maintained and relentlessly renewed or it is lost. Nations, no less than successful business enterprises, are endlessly at risk from disruptive new military technology and creative leaders who can determine how to successfully deploy new weapons.
During the last half-decade President Bush and the Bush administration have been dilly-dallying over Iraq and Saddam Hussein. Bush & Co. invented pretexts to invade, and now the entire U. S. Army—which was supposedly deigned to be capable of fighting 2-1/2 wars at the same time (!)—can't even control Greater Baghdad.
In the meantime, China has been developing technology to assert and exert its control over the next area of potential world military conflict: space. A few days ago the Chinese shot down a satellite using an anti-satellite weapon.
Overnight, much of America's space technology has been become endangered and obsolete. The day your communications and intelligence satellites can be knocked out by someone else's rockets is the day you can no longer claim "super" status.
The United States remains an immensely powerful nation with superior military forces. The Iraq conflict can't endanger the strength of our navy or air force. But our unquestioned worldwide influence has now been diluted. For the first time in decades we have been rendered vulnerable, by China's endangerment of our space-based power.
Congress, of course—both Democrats and Republicans—have ignored the growing Chinese threat because it was easier to keep stomping on poor George W Bush and proving he was an incompetent boob when it came to foreign policy. Well, the days of easy or "cheap" criticism of Bush, Donald "Rummy" Rumsfeld and the defense establishment are over.
Today China has become a major threat to our future military capabilities. We are "super" no longer.
The capability to destroy satellites is the capability to render much of the U. S. defense establishment helpless and blind. We rely on satellites to control our airplanes, to spy for us from both high and low altitudes, and to provide guidance right down to the platoon level with handheld devices and intelligence systems. Today those satellites are all endangered. Our military establishment has been put at risk, virtually overnight.
The surrender-at-any-cost apologists now have a new cause. Demo Surrendercrat Ed Markey has already been quoted in the Washington Post as saying we must "negotiate" to stop the Chinese. Fat chance.
Liberal dreamers, and even some conservative dreamers, always like to dream away problems.
Nuclear weapons? Just prohibit everyone else from building them. Dream away.
Space. Just "negotiate" for peace. Dream away.
Since 1972 the United States has helped China make a peaceful transition from a warlike nation to a relatively peaceful one. But that relatively peaceful country is still expanding its war-making capabilities and has now projected its growing capabilities into space by shooting down a satellite.
China has become more civilized in the past half-century but not nearly civilized enough. Chinese leaders and government officials are still capable of incredibly arrogant and aggressive military policy decisions, as they were when they grounded a U. S. reconnaissance plane early in the Bush administration.
China is still a rogue state by Western standards. China
censors the Internet, imprisons journalists and tries desperately to maintain the internal trappings of a police state while seeking to appear open and accessible in the world of commerce. Those contradictions can't last forever. Because of internal pressure China is a potential explosion waiting to happen. Some desperate leader might decide instead to trigger an external explosion. Tora. Tora. Tora.
And China is sitting on one trillion dollars of "reserves" while Chinese entrepreneurs steal our technology, pilfer our intellectual property and plan for the day when China will issue orders to the United States and not vice versa.
And guess who has also been undermining our security by selling China critical technology: our "friends," the Israelis.
Russia lost the cold war because that nation ultimately went bankrupt. They had nothing to sell to generate the wealth necessary to arm and rearm endlessly. China has virtually bottomless financial reserves to compete with the United States militarily—because Americans are providing that money through our insatiable appetite for Chinese products. Well.
President John Kennedy was famous for his Harvard thesis, "Why England Slept," a study of how England allowed Germany to rearm and prepare for World War II. By no means do I want to suggest we are on the brink of war. But China's preparations and policies could easily lead us into war at some future time.
Some of us have already noticed—many probably by surprise—how China's demand for hydrocarbons (oil) have driven up prices of energy and other natural resources. We lapsed into a bidding "war" without realizing it. Surprise.
Soon China will be able to confront our policies not only in Asia but also in other parts of the world, including the Middle East.
I pray that someday, somewhere, some student won’t author a senior thesis arguing "Why America Slept." But it sure looks like George Bush & Co. were asleep. While Bush & Co. were chasing Saddam Hussein, looking for imaginary weapons of mass destruction, China was quietly building real weapons of mass destruction. Sleep on that.
________________________________________________Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national and world politics with forty years of personal experience; he is America’s most respected independent foreign policy, military and intelligence analyst. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com; contrariancommentary.blogspot.com; contrariancommentary.wordpress.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 17, 2006
REGIME REMNANTS REFUSE TO SURRENDER; DEAD ENDERS BATTLE IN THE STREETS.
CHICAGO'S STATE STREET WAR MAKES IT TO BROADWAY
(Chicago, January 17, 2007) Regime remnants battling in the streets? "Deadenders" who refuse to surrender? Field generals replaced? Commanders under the gun?

Baghdad?

No.

Chicago. The battle for Marshall Field & Co. is being waged on State Street.

Sun-Times columnist Mark Brown once wrote that Marshall Field's "anchored State Street." Actually, the store anchored the entire Midwest. The "day of the department store" may have passed, but not in Chicago. We still love our Marshall Field's.

The State Street store was a great icon to midwestern enterprise and independence. I have been a Field's shopper since the 1960's. My home was furnished there. The store has been updated several times. It was regularly modernized. In the years when Field's management had offices on the 9th floor there was local control and local input. Marshall Field's (the family of Marshall Field has long since ceased to have any interest in the company) helped develop suburban Chicago, and the Magnificent Mile. Water Tower Place was a Field's development.

Field's embodied the best of the department store tradition and State Street was the crown jewel.

Then Macy's bought Field's, claiming department stores were dying, and said it was going to change Field's into a Macy's.

Last Tuesday most of the Chicago Tribune's letters to the editor concerned Macy's changes at Fields. The Sun-Times had similar coverage in its business section. This is four months after the name change!

Managers are being reassigned. Senior management is perplexed. Last year, Macy's changed hundreds of store names from coast-to-coast but nowhere but Chicago did the War of Field's develop.

Chicago has been enduring a relentless loss of status over the past few decades. The venerable First National Bank of Chicago became New York's Chase Manhattan Bank. Continental Illinois Bank failed and became Bank of America. There is even a "New York & Co." store on State Street (but no "Chicago & Co." store on Fifth Avenue). No one likes to think of himself or herself as an appendix; we all know what happens to appendixes. And so the loss of Marshall Field's may have been the last straw for irate Midwesterners.

Macy's quickly promised to continue Field's traditions. Yes, the tree was there last month. The Walnut Room is still open. I don't know if "Frango" mints are again being produced in Chicago. But they better be. Soon. Or else.

Chicago's newspapers have been someone ambivalent about this retail tempest. The Sun-Times, which always received fewer Field's ad dollars despite being a newspaper started by a Marshall Field descendant, has been more composed and willing to let commerce have its way.

The Chicago Tribune, always Field's mainstay medium, has been more sympathetic to the loss and has lavished coverage on the anti-Macy's combatants, at a time when the Tribune's own traditions are eroded and under attack.

Today the New York Times finally noticed ("Loss of Marshall Field's Has Store Loyalists Seeing Red").

State Street had come to Broadway.

When will it end? I don't really know.

I'm a guy who grew up in a town called Middletown, on a street called Main Street. I lived with struggling small merchants, with local stores. I remember when E. J. Korvette came to Hartford, Connecticut. G. Fox & Co. was never the same.

I realize times have changed and tastes have changed. And yet, Field's was Field's and Field's on State Street anchored the main street of the Midwest. Even Macy's has been afraid to remove the "Marshall Field and Company" signs on the State Street store. Yup, the wall signs are still there, a reminder of past glory and present ignominy. Given what has been going on since last year, who wants to be the brave soul to even cast a glace at removing those storied signs?

There is something else about Field's that is special. It represents and virtually catalogues racial progress in Chicago. The time was, few blacks worked in Field's and probably fewer shopped there. But today Field's is color blind (except to green) and minorities are equally and fairly represented. That's why this store represented the soul of the city. It benchmarked racial progress and the racial peace in Chicago that slowly evolved out of the hatred and hostility of the 1960's.

It is clear that Macy's underestimated Chicagoans and underestimated Midwesterners.

Sadly, the local management ultimately sold out some years ago. Dayton Hudson from Minneapolis, another department store chain, took over. But then that company changed its name to Target (Tarzhay?) and dumped its department stores. It was not until Federated Department Stores took over and announced a name change to Macy's that Midwesterners declared war.

I wrote an earlier column before Macy's changed Field's name, decrying the loss of local control and most of all of local merchandize "buyers" who selected products available only at Field's.

Macy's management suggested economies of scale (mass
purchasing power and efficiency) would make for higher profits. But that concept only works if people want to buy your merchandise. I remain to be convinced that the "one store" concept for hundreds of Macy's locations will succeed. Local buyers were what made department stores special, and I don’t see any evidence that mass will ultimately succeed over class.

For now, the war continues. The loyal shoppers who felt abandoned when Field's became Macy's have put a dent in corporate profits. State Street is a battleground. The suits in New York who make decisions don’t know what to do. Come to think about it, Macy's and Field's do have a lot in common with Baghdad and Washington. Distant mangers think they know better than the locals. That war has been going on as long as cities and civilization.

Of course, when I was a kid, at holiday time we would leave Main Street and head for Herald Square. To visit the real and only Macy's. We skipped the pale replica that eventually surfaced in New Haven and finally closed. But then that's another story.--------------------------Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. He is a chronicler of all things Midwestern and the authentic Voice of Middle America. Copyright Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national and international politics with forty years of personal experience. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 16, 2007

BARACK OBAMA IS "THE CANDIDATE"

OBAMA BLASTS THE SYSTEM THAT CREATED HIM, BITES THE HAND THAT FEEDS HIM

HYPOCRITE TAKES FIRST STEPS TOWARDS PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN

(CHICAGO)(January 16, 2007) In the 1960's I had a lady friend who loved Robert Redford. So, naturally, I got dragged to all of Redford's movies. I saw "The Candidate" several times.

In that film, Mr. McKay (Redford), a "community organizer" like Barack Obama, hatches a slogan, "McKay, The Better Way" to run for office. Ironically, Barack "Barry" Obama has now chosen "The Better Way" as his mantra through February 10th. Well. Obama's slogan has about as much substance as the celluloid version popularized by Robert Redford.

Obama is entirely a creation of wealthy contributors and powerful, liberal media interests. So what he does he do? He attacks the hands that created him, and bites the hands that feed him. So much for gratitude.

Obama says that he was once a "community organizer." What did he organize? I thought he was a "law professor." Or at least an adjunct professor such as myself. What cases did he win? Obama is entirely a creation of liberal media and fantasies. He has no experience; his entire career has been a complete mirage, advanced by affirmative action and a conscious avoidance by society of his lack of substantial professional accomplishments.

Other than traveling to Kenya to visit distant relatives related to the father who abandoned him, what does Obama know of the world? Is he the man best qualified to lead us into the uncertain waters of a war against terrorism and a restoration of American prestige in the wake of Iraq? Please.

Other than having a family that has become wealthy feeding off liberal pablum, and milking the "system" for every advantage that a guilt-ridden, affirmative action endorsing society has perpetuated decade after decade, what has he accomplished in any sphere of life? Not much, it seems.

Ironically, Obama has one of the most complex and conflicted psyches of any presidential candidate in recent history. Abandoned both by his mother and father, raised by his white grandparents, whom he keeps locked in the cellar, his personality is so unusual that it could form a basis for a course in psychology. We do not need another conflicted psyche in the White House. I'll know Obama is serious about life and leadership when he appears in public with his white grandmother and features her on the dais. Instead of hiding her in the cellar. Obama is clearly uncomfortable presenting his white relatives to the public. What a way to treat Grandma.

Obama attacks big money in politics. But who has been fueling his career for the past two years? Billionaires such as Warren Buffet. How can someone who is the product of "money and influence" run against the hands of "money and influence" that are fueling his own campaign? It makes no sense.

Talk about big money? What about Tony Rezko? Obama is linked to the sleaziest and most corrupt elements in Illinois politics. He says he made a "mistake" in dealing with Rezko. He didn't make any mistake. He new exactly what he was doing and he knew exactly who Tony Rezko was when they engaged in structured real estate deals together. It was "honest graft," very possibly a criminal offense.

Then Obama lied. He said he had not afforded Rezko any access. Subsequently, a Rezko-recommended intern popped up in Obama's office. Another "mistake?" Not really; the son of Joseph Armanda is the G. David Schine of 2008.

Of course, if you believe Obama's excuse and explanation about Rezko then Obama is an incompetent nincompoop. Obama says that while serving as a U. S. Senator he didn’t really know who his partner was in a million-dollar-plus real estate transaction. He saw no appearance of impropriety. You want a jerk like that managing the U.S. economy?

Obama is no more grassroots at the national level than Hillary Clinton.

In the past few days Obama has been sashaying around the issue of cutting off funds for Iraq. The liberal left in the Democratic Party wants to turn off Bush's financial spigot. Obama is tap dancing around that one. He won’t come out and say where he stands. He was hiding in the senate cellar last year when tough issues were being debated.

Frankly, he and Hillary make a nice pair. You can't get a straight answer out of either one. Which is why neither one is likely to end up in the White House. She thinks a whirlwind four-day trip to Iraq qualifies her as an expert. The last president we had who took a whirlwind trip to the Middle East before becoming a candidate was George Bush, and look where he landed us.

Still, I'm glad he's running. For decades now, in the wake of the civil rights revolution, we have had African-Americans bellyaching that they are held back, that government does not serve their needs, that taxpayers should do more. They want today's taxpayers to fund "reparations" for pre-Civil War slavery 150 years ago. Volunteers, anyone?

Where does Obama stand on reparations for slavery? That's a big issue in the Chicago City Council. Does he support or oppose reparations? Can he give us a straight answer?

Ironically, the same seniority system that minorities have castigated has now advanced several A-A's to committee chairmanships in the U. S. House. Let's see what they do.

A couple of weeks ago Obama played the race card and said barriers were higher for him. That's malarkey. No white man with his skimpy resume would be considered a serious candidate for president. It is precisely and only because Obama had a black father than he is even sitting in the senate. White guilt has propelled him into the senate. Let's see if white guilt can propel him out of the senate and into the White House.

Frankly, I wish Obama the best. I wish the best for anyone running for president. Or any public office (including myself). But, as for Obama, I have my doubts whether he has the "right stuff." I see no experience, no qualifications, and no strong inner core. He has shown he can talk the talk, yessiree. But he has never shown he can walk the walk. Barry, start walkin'.

Obama is right about one thing though. The system is "broken." A political system that would produce Obama as an instant candidate for high national office is broken. Seriously broken.

------------------------------------------
Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2006. Martin covers national and world politics with forty years of personal experience. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639.

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 15, 2007
INSIDE THE BUSH WHITE HOUSE: PART ONE
THE SECRET SURGE AND THE REAL PLAN BEHIND BUSH'S LAST STAND
(CHICAGO)(January 15, 2007) Why is Bush gambling his presidency on plans for a "surge" of American forces in Baghdad? Bush's Last Stand?
On December 13th I reported that the "surge" story had been dropped in my lap in September, and I had fumbled the ball. No more. The inside exclusives to ContrarianCommentary.com keep coming, and now we are churning them out on time.
There is a secret story behind the surge. Bush is not turning Baghdad over to his critics easily. President Bush is not a man that likes to be embarrassed, or second-guessed. But he has had to eat a double helping of humble pie.
Policy in Baghdad is being turned over to Ryan Crocker, an opponent of Paul Bremer's catastrophic Coalition Provisional Authority. Military control is going to General David Petraeus, a critic of our initial tactics early in Iraq and an early arrival at the altar of the theory and practice of revolutionary war. The Washington Post made clear on January 14 that control over Iraqi operations is rapidly passing to people within the government and military who were opponents of Paul Bremer and the prevailing approach to Iraq in 2003.
President Bush is not doing all of this because he enjoys going on national television and admitting mistakes or conceding errors were made. He is making these changes under de facto orders (see Part II, tomorrow). He further confirmed his ultimate goal when he stated on CBS' 60 Minutes that he was branding Moktada al-Sadr an enemy of the United States.
Ultimately, Bush has been forced to confront the racism and contempt that his administration have held Arabs and the Middle East. Their political doctrines began and ended with Israel and Ariel Sharon. The Israelis have contempt for Arabs; Bush & Co. shared that arrogance and disdain. Now, finally and desperately, as Bush makes a final effort to rescue himself, he is putting people in power in the U.S. country team who respect the Arab world and are comfortable dealing with Iraqis and Arabs generally.
It is crucial to realize the "surge" did not originate in November, or in December, or after any policy review by President Bush. The surge has been in the planning stages for months. Indeed, the term "surge" is itself a McGuffin, a dramatic device used to shift attention from the real theme of a drama.
What is the ultimate goal of the surge? To deploy U. S. forces across Baghdad so that if a coup is necessary to remove the current prime minister and place a hard line leader in control, the military will have been "embedded" long in advance.
Why does a coup figure in all of this planning? Because even opponents of President Bush recognize that an American humiliation in Iraq and ignominious withdrawal will doom U.S. foreign policy for a generation. That is why Senator Joe Biden's slapdash attacks on boarding the "last helicopter to leave the Green Zone" are so despicable. Even consistent opponents of the war such as myself recognize that Bush & Co. have created such a mess that we cannot allow them to founder into final and complete failure.
Planning for a coup has long been on the periphery of U. S. policy. We have continued the pretense of "Iraqi democracy" long after the term became laughable. But because a military coup in Iraq, to place an independent secular Shiite in control, is distasteful to the political establishment in Washington the plan has been disguised as "ramping up" for expanded operations.
A coup may be the only way to assert reason and reality in Iraq. In 2004, when he made a show of returning Iraqi sovereignty, Bush was on a political timetable. He wanted the job done before the November election. The turnover was hurried, and we have been paying the price since then. Now Bush is on a legacy timetable. He has one last, desperate chance to salvage a small part of his place in history by bringing his chaotic campaign up to breakeven.
Ironically, Prime Minister al-Maliki knows exactly what is going on, as do his political coterie. But they are powerless to protest, suspended in a twilight zone and no man's land between Shiite extremists and the Bush administration. That's why they have been both powerless to stop the surge and cognizant of what it means for them: potential extinction.
Shiites have always been cautious because while the U. S. "freed" Iraq in 2004 we kept control of the defense ministry and military apparatus.
How would a coup operate? First, U. S. units are being
paired with Iraqi units. They will start developing cohesion and loyalty. Thousands of new translators are on the way from the U. S. Second, we are embedding advisors with units right down to the company level.
U. S. forces and military manuals continue to refer to "counterinsurgency," a term that in the early 1960's was abbreviated as "COIN." But what we are experiencing in Iraq is "Revolutionary War," a term first used by my mentor Professor Bernard Fall during the Viet-Nam era. Today the United States is finally realizing it faces revolutionary war conditions across the Middle East.
Because few persons today have a military background, and few have served with or in the military, we generally fail to understand military loyalty, ethos and constancy. One of the tactics of waging revolutionary war, or counterinsurgency, is to establish genuine bonds between the men and women on the front lines. Our policy in 2003 was to avoid such contacts and such closeness.
Soldiers are loyal, first to each other, and second to other soldiers, even opponents. That’s why if we had ordered the Iraqi Army to report for duty in 2003, uniforms pressed, shoes shined, soldiers would have reported and saluted, and likely helped us prevent the insurgency. Instead, we alienated the Iraqi army.
For myself, I helped an old soldier who had served with the Iraqi Army under British officers, and who wanted to visit his family in Toronto. I went to the U.K. Embassy to help him with his efforts. He understood that we shared a mutual loyalty.
If General Petraeus is smart, and I am sure he is, Iraqi units will soon see new equipment, clean uniforms, more food and generally better treatment than they have received in the past. Unit morale must be enhanced before soldiers can be trusted to follow orders.
The aftermath of a coup: a new "revolutionary government" would return to power many of the original players in the Iraqi Governing Council who were pushed aside in the rush to hold elections and kowtow to Shiite extremists.
The pieces are rapidly being put in place for a coup. The Shiites see what is happening. It may not be evident in Washington or Chicago, but it is clearly obvious in Baghdad. Either al-Maliki brings Bush the head of Moktada al-Sadr or Maliki is history and a new Iraqi government will be placed in power through a joint U. S./Iraqi Army coup.
You read it first at ContrarianCommentary.com, from inside the Bush White House.
________________________________________________Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national and world politics with forty years of personal experience; he is America’s most respected independent foreign policy, military and intelligence analyst. Andy is a Middle East expert who is Executive Director of the Revolutionary War Research Center, the original consortium devoted to counterinsurgency, guerilla war and political insurrection. He has spent 36 years in and out of the Middle East and spent much of 2003 in Iraq. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com; contrariancommentary.blogspot.com; contrariancommentary.wordpress.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 15, 2007

THE DEATH OF TWO PRESIDENTS: PART THREE

BYE, BYE SADDAM

(The final installment of a three-part series in which Andy Martin expresses distinctly contrarian but absolutely correct views on the passing of Saddam Hussein)

(Chicago)(January 15, 2007) Saddam, America will miss you.

The bloodthirsty manner in which George Bush & Company allowed you to be murdered by your Shiite enemies will reverberate through the Middle East for a generation, maybe longer.

You were America's best friend in the Middle East, strongest ally and most reliable partner. Only you didn't know it and neither did George Bush.

Adding to your luster you went to your dearth with dignity, as a lynch mob catcalled and acted with bloodthirsty bravado towards a condemned man.

You were also Israel's best guy in the Middle East. The Israelis, those famously self-destructive people who always accuse their enemies of "never missing an opportunity to miss an opportunity," while acting in the same fashion themselves, will find your loss tragic, perhaps even fatal.

How can I sing your praises when the U.S. Government excoriated you in life and celebrated you in death? Well, look at the record.

In the deathless words of Paul Bremer, "We got him." That's you. We got you. At the time of your capture in December, 2003 I wrote a column arguing that with you finally in the hands of the Americans the real insurgency would now begin. And it did.

Of course, I was attacked by the right-wing nut jobs for telling the truth and correctly predicting the future. A prophet is not without honor. I could see what was coming. Only Bush & Co. could not.

Now you are all dead. Paul Bremer suffers the ultimate ignominy. He endures a living death, a daily death of being held in contempt for his incompetent stewardship of Iraq. The Iraq Study Group never mentioned his name; he has been erased, the final victim of commissars who like their Russian predecessors erase faces and names from history. You, at least, have become a martyr. Bush, Bremer, Saddam. Your light will shine long after B&B's have dimmed. And the Bush dynasty? Don't ask. Jeb says he has no future. And he doesn’t.

Why was it that we never saw in you the fine qualities of a steadfast ally and reliable partner? Well, you were just as much of a bloodthirsty psychopath as your enemies. You ruled Iraq with insane sons, with a criminal clique of murderers. You were not a lace-curtain dictator.

But until the time April Glaspie came into your courts and said that "Kuwait is a far off place, of which George Bush (I) knows little," and virtually licensed your invasion of that principality, Iraq was a pretty free place. Not free by the standards of New York and London, but free by the standards of Tehran and Tripoli.

Of course like the Mubareks and Saudis and al-Assads and all of the other tin pot despots of the Middle East you jailed your opponents, tortured them, and often killed them. But then doesn’t the CIA now send its prisoners to Egypt to be tortured? How could the Saddam "dynasty" be any different than the "Bush dynasty" when you both torture your opponents and imprison them without due process of law? Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib are more alike than different. As subsequent events have proven.

Yes, you killed a lot more people than Bush did, a lot more, but that's only because you were headquartered in a more dangerous neighborhood than Washington. But are small murders any more morally exculpatory than mass murders? You were executed for a handful of crimes, but allowed to escape a verdict for mass murder. So will it be with Bush pere et fils.

So, what went right between us? Well, America encouraged you to attack Iran in 1980. Iran was America's biggest enemy, then as now. And you took the bait. You wasted a million young Iraqi lives to do America's dirty business. We gave you the gas to drive off to war. Literally. You were our friend. Rummy (Donald Rumsfeld) was given a great welcome; he will be forever linked with you in the famous picture taken in 1983.

The Kurds. Well, Nixon betrayed them, and Reagan betrayed them. The Republicans betrayed them all the way back to 1920. Why should the Bushes be any different? We betrayed the Kurds, again, in 1991 because you were more important than the Kurds. And you were. Was it worth removing you to cement the history and future of Kurdistan?

Why did those cunning Israelis hate you so? Of course, in the chaos of the First Gulf War you launched missiles on Israel. You were frustrated, irritated. But by then America had lost you, and launched Iraq on the fundamentalist road from which it may never return, at least not in my lifetime.

The Israelis lobbied young George Bush to attack, attack, and attack. "Saddam is our number one enemy," they said. Poor fool, he believed them. But there is a world of difference between being a nation's number one enemy and number one nuisance. Israelis knew that you didn't have the bomb, even if George Bush didn't. They knew you were a nuisance not a nemesis.

The greatest loser from the Second Gulf war? Israel.

Still, they goaded poor, helpless George Bush and his neo-cons into attacking. "The Road to Jerusalem runs through Baghdad" they said with utter contempt for reality in 2002. Now we know better. Maybe even George Bush and hapless Condo Rice realize the reverse is true: the road to Baghdad runs through Jerusalem. And that road is still empty and untraveled.

On balance you did Israel much more good than harm. Yes, you sent a few dollars to the families of the departed freedom fighters. Symbolically, you were an irritant. But you don't fight wars to remove irritants. Only know we know that painful truism. Too late.

More importantly, you remained a steadfast opponent of the mullahs until the day you were removed; maybe that’s why you could never believe America would attack. You saw our own vital interests better than we did. You were also Israel's great bulwark against Persian imperialism and adventurism. Israel will come to realize that truth, also too late.

The Iranians could huff and puff but ultimately they could not cross Iraq. Now Iraq is an open highway to the "Shiite crescent." Or so they say. The Israelis are always manufacturing enemies and mangling friends. So let it be with you, Saddam (look at what a mess they have made of the Americans, their friends; you are in good company.)

George Bush could have been a great president. He had conservative majorities in Congress. He could have strengthened America and left a powerful nation even more powerful. Instead, he has squandered our fortune pursuing you. Over a trillion dollars (they won’t admit to that number, but it's true) have vanished pursuing the illusion that Saddam was an enemy.

You traveled along road from "Best Bud" in 1983 to "Archenemy" in 1990? Who lost Iraq then? Who lost it again in 2003? Now you belong to the history books.

There are two great rivers that run through Iraq. The Tigris and the Euphrates. But there is a third great river, seen only dimly in the mists of Arab history: the River of Tears.

I vividly remember the sad day when my good friend Merwyn came into the library at prep school crying, "They have killed the king." Indeed, they had. Iraq had descended into a chaos from which it has never recovered, never escaped. That was 1958.

My heart cried for the people of Iraq then. But Iraq was to be victimized by insanity, decade after decade, occupied by aliens from a strange world of dictatorship, of bloodthirsty revenge and revanche. Sadly, Arab nationalism has never built a nation. Now we know. The last "good old days" Baghdad has known came under a British king, a Hashemite; he was murdered too.

And I fear America is now descending into an international chaos from which it may not be so easy to escape. Since 2003 the world has become a more dangerous place, for George Bush and for us. His enemies are triumphant, on the march. Extremism, fundamentalism. Poor, George, he still believes America is a safer because Saddam is gone. Do they really believe that in Israel as well? We have exchanged one friend who acted like an enemy, for a bunch of enemies who will never act like friends.

In Washington, Saddam, they miss you already.

Yes, strange and sad to say, we do miss you. And more to come in the days ahead. We have ransomed your place in history with the treasure of Emperor Bush. Come to think of it, that was America's treasure. In money, in power, in lives and respect. And now it is all gone, gone to dust, Saddam, just like you.

Bye, bye, Saddam. And, as you and George Bush sink slowly into the sands of history, two Ozymandian relics, no one will come to love you more than George Bush himself. Father and son. They will both wonder, "How did we take someone who did our bidding, an asset if not an ally, and kill him off? And make the world a lot worse off than it was?

Good question.

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NEXT: COMING, a worldwide excusive Inside the Bush White House. Only on ContrarianCommentary.com

NEWS FROM:
ANDY MARTIN for
U. S. Senator

ATTENTION: ASSIGNMENT/DAYBOOK EDITORS

ANNOUNCEMENT OF CHICAGO NEWS CONFERENCE:

MIDDLE EAST EXPERT AND INTERNET EDITOR ANDY MARTIN WILL SEEK REPUBLICAN NOD TO RUN AGAINST SENATOR DURBIN


(CHICAGO)(January 11, 2007) Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin will hold a news conference Thursday, January 11th at 11:00 A.M. to announce he is seeking the Republican nomination for U. S. Senator to run against Sen. Dick Durbin. Martin will lead criticism and counterattacks on Durbin’s Iraq priorities.

Andy spent much of 2003 in Iraq and worked in Baghdad as an investigative analyst and bureau chief. He strongly opposed the invasion of Iraq. He is a respected Middle East expert who first went to the area in 1971.

Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. Andy holds a Juris Doctor degree (1969) from the University of Illinois College of Law. He has been fighting political corruption in Illinois for forty (40) years and helped lay the foundations for Operation Greylord that sent corrupt Chicago politicians and judges to jail.

“I will try to unify Republicans in Illinois,” says Martin. “It won’t be easy. My opposition to the war in Iraq is well-known. But I believe that only a Republican who has challenged our policies in the Middle East will have any chance of being taken seriously. 2008 will be a very difficult year for Republican candidates.

“Nevertheless, as a Middle East expert whose analysis and predictions have received international credibility and respect I am the only Republican with the cred and experience to run against Senator Durbin. It will be a David and Goliath contest, and I am practicing my slingshot techniques. My template will be Everett Dirksen’s upset victory over Scott Lucas in 1950.

Ironically, both Durbin and Martin worked for U. S. Senator Paul Douglas in 1966. “I think Senator Douglas would be deeply disappointed by the way Durbin has become an agent of betrayal and backstabbing in our foreign policy,” Martin states.

“Republicans in Washington fumbled the ball. They started in the 1990’s with sound proposals and programs and ended up as corrupt hacks. They paid the price. Now it is time to rebuild with good policy. But the Democrats are equally guilty and equally corrupt.

“My campaign will build on mainstream, Middle American values. It is time for the Land of Lincoln to be heard again. Mr. Durbin will be a formidable opponent but so will I.”

NEWS CONFERENCE DETAILS:

WHO: Internet journalist/editor Andy Martin

WHERE: Southeast corner of Wabash and Huron Streets,
Chicago, (St. James Cathedral)

WHEN: Thursday, January 11, 2007 11:00 A.M.

WHAT: Andy Martin will announce he is running as a Republican candidate for United States senator

MEDIA
CONTACT: (312) 440-4124

WEBSITE: To come

E-MAIL: AndyMart20@aol.com

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 7, 2007

"I TOLD YOU SO," PART TWO

"MR. PRESIDENT, BRING HOME OUR HEROES"

[Editor's note: With "I told you so," Part One, Andy initiated a beginning-of-the-year series of comments on some of his predictions and projections that have stood the test of time.]

(CHICAGO)(January 7, 2007) Late in December 2005 my gubernatorial campaign team began meeting to determine where our primary campaign effort should be concentrated. My recommendation: we address head-on the issue that would be decisive in November: the Iraq War.

I prepared a "dummy" radio commercial and tag line: "Mr. President, Bring Home Our Heroes." The commercial went through several roundtable revisions and redrafting before it was finally approved for production.

My view was apodictic: if Republicans did not face reality, the reality that Iraq would overshadow the 2006 elections, there was no sense in wasting time on subsidiary matters.

"Bring Home Our Heroes" hit the Chicago airwaves at the beginning of January 2006. The result was electric: an avalanche of hate mail from Republicans who attacked me for a variety of reasons from "undermining the president" to "being a Democrat," and some accusations that are unprintable. My stock response was that if Republicans refused to hear the truth from a Republican in the primary, they would most assuredly hear the truth from Democrats in November. And they did.

Rick Pearson at the Chicago Tribune, a sympathizer of old-line Republicans, unleashed a "smear team" of reporters to investigate my radio advertising and to destroy my campaign for governor with a backstabbing article that was prepared without any input from me.

Every time my campaign ad ran on a radio station across the state of Illinois there would be hate e-mails from Republicans. The writers were so desperate to believe in the failed Iraq policy that they refused to hear the truth from someone who had been in Iraq and predicted the collapse. (You can still hear the ad at AndyforIllinois.com, ad #2.)

"My year in Baghdad," 2003, was perhaps the most challenging of my life. I wrote and reported from Iraq not with a sense of glee, but with a sense of foreboding that everything the United States was doing would boomerang and come back to haunt us. Sadly, I was right. No one likes to predict doom and disaster and be correct.

I often sat in my apartment in Baghdad questioning myself: can I be right? Is Bremer as much of an incompetent as you think? Are his munchkins as bad as you believe? Are the conditions being created for a disaster-to-come? Every time I asked these questions I satisfied myself that my investigations and reactions and responses and conclusions were correct. And they were.

Thus, when I went on the air in Illinois as a candidate I had a demonstrable record of accurate political analysis to support the underpinnings of our campaign advertising.

Well, the rest is history. I didn’t win the primary for governor. Judy Topinka did. Topinka had entered the race after being assured by national Republican leaders she would be given a financial arsenal to compete in the general election. They lied. Topinka was given some assistance but not remotely enough to compete with the campaign cash-laden incumbent governor. Today Topinka is auctioning off the memorabilia of her life in politics in $2 and $3 increments.

And the entire election turned on Iraq. Many independents voted against Republicans simply because they were Republicans. President Bush, in attacking the Democrats, inadvertently "nationalized" the election against local Republican candidates as well. Solid Republicans across Cook County and Illinois went down to defeat.

The reality is that if Bush had stopped to listen to the heartland, where real people live and work and struggle, he could have won the 2006 election. "Bring Home Our Heroes" was an iconic ad, iconic in its reflection of reality. But few in the Republican Party were listening. In Washington, Republicans had become so arrogant and corrupt and lobbyist-laden that they lived in a semi-presidential "bubble." The bubble burst on election night.

Now 2008 looms. I am weighing my options. Maybe people will listen better this time than they did the last. Stay tuned to ContrarianCommentary.com to see what's coming. In Illinois in 2006, as in Baghdad in 2003, I was a helluva of an analyst and prognosticator.

------------------------------------------Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national and world politics with forty years of personal experience. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com; contrariancommentary.blogspot.com; contrariancommentary.wordpress.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639. Andy is a graduate of the University of Illinois. He was a candidate for the Republican Party nomination for Governor in the 2006 primary.

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 3, 2007

BARACK OBAMA: PLEASE LET YOUR WHITE RELATIVES OUT OF THE CLOSET

WHERE'S BARRY'S WHITE GRANDMA?

IS OBAMA GUILTY OF RACISM?

"HEY SIS!"

(CHICAGO)(January 3, 2007) During the recent campaign I wrote about Senator George Allen of Virginia ("Bubbe is Bupkis"), who had hidden his grandmother to conceal his Jewish roots.

When is Barack "Barry" Obama, the itinerant hustler-senator, going to bring his grandmother out of the closet?

Grannies are special. They offer unconditional love to grandchildren. They overlook family troubles and try to bring peace to domestic disturbances. They are a treasure.

The way Obama treats his white relatives is scandalous and racist.

Barack Obama nominally represents the People of Illinois. I say nominally because he does everything he can to avoid Illinois and, when he appears, he appears clueless. He claims "his staff" actually represents Illinois. Obama represents only himself.

Last month Obama was on the road to New Hampshire and other points far away from Illinois. When he had a chance to go home and at least spend Christmas with his fellow Illinoisans, he chose to go off to Hawaii to "visit family." Well.

Obama "visited family" last summer. He went to Kenya and posed as a Kenyan-American. He prominently featured distant cousins and half siblings, all of whom were African-African.

For Christmas he went to Hawaii, with a totally different approach. He ignored any public displays of connection to his white relative; his white grandmother was kept out of press view. Likewise his sister. He made no disclosure of any family contacts and media were forced to rely on second-hand information. There were no photo-ops with his white relative. (Check Google and Obama + sister or grandmother under Images)

Obama's sister spoke with the Associated Press, but it is not clear if that conversation was in person or on the phone. His sister, Maya Soetoro, said she was discussing presidential politics with her brother so there is a natural interest in who she is and what she is advising.

If the closeting of Obama's white relative is not blatant racism and contempt for the intelligence of the people of Illinois and America, I don't know what is. Hiding your relatives because they undermine your racial politics? That's what it looks like.

I have stated in the past Obama is a deeply conflicted human being. Under the veneer of what Washington Post writer Donna Britt last week called "cool," there is burning conflict and contradiction. Is he angry with his white relative? Ashamed of her? Why does he treat her differently than his Kenyan clan? Why are the blacks publicized and the whites ostracized? Why? Where's Granny?

Mr. Obama, you have a lot of explaining to do. And it ain't cool. I can't believe anyone would feature one side of his family and hide the other, but that's what you are doing.

Where's your white grandma? And your sister?

Or don’t they want to be seen in public with you?

Answers please.
------------------------------------------
Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2006. Martin covers national politics with forty years of personal experience. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639.

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 5, 2007

"I TOLD YOU SO," PART ONE

PAUL BREMER AND HIS BAGHDAD BUNGLERS

[Editor's note: With "I told you so," Part One, Andy initiates a beginning-of-the-year series of comments on some of his predictions and projections that have stood the test of time.]

(CHICAGO)(January 5, 2007) In June 2003, shortly after Paul Bremer arrived in Baghdad, I sent him a 10-point letter outlining what needed to be done to revive Iraq. I was living in Baghdad as an independent analyst/investigator/writer and made practical suggestions based on personal observations.

Unfortunately, Bremer had already barricaded himself inside his Green Zone ("Emerald City" as I called it) and was as remote from the Iraqi people as the Viceroy of India had been from ordinary Indians.

Bremer had surrounded himself with a group of right-wing jokers whom I called the "weenies" ("Greenies" if you prefer). The weenies/Greenies were people who had gone to Iraq on a right-wing mission, to spread the Gospel of Bush to the infidel masses. Prominent among Bremer's weenies were Dan Senor, his mouthpiece, and Roman Martinez, another of Bremer's sycophants.

In my "Letter to Paul Bremer" I told Bremer that he needed to clean up the streets and put people to work. I told him he needed someone like Ed Koch, former Mayor of New York, not Bernard Kerick, Rudy Giuliani's Police Commissioner, to jump-start the economy. I even mentioned the "Doe Fund" in New York that puts people to work and pays them to stay clean.

In short, I exhorted Bremer to put money in the hands of ordinary people and let them restart their own economy and their own country. Bremer was too busy sending billions of dollars to politically favored contractors to heed my admonitions.

Thus, it was with a sense of both sadness and disgust that I read today's Wall Street Journal (January 5, 2007) and found the weenies popping up there. Yes, Senor and Martinez wrote a column with the startling disclosure that "The funds appropriated by our government barely affect the lives of average Iraqis." Why didn’t they see this 3-1/2 years ago? Why didn’t they announce it? Why didn’t they do something? Protest? Tell their boss? Anything?

Maybe no one cared. They were too busy taking care of the contractors.

Sadly, they were all ensconced in Saddam's former palaces when they should have been living in tents and meeting ordinary Iraqis every day.

The Journal says Senor and Martinez were "foreign policy advisors" to Paul Bremer. Is it any wonder the Bush administration self-destructed in Baghdad? That Bush will be entombed in the sands of history like Shelley's Ozymandias? Who hired Senor and Martinez? On what basis could give they "foreign policy advice" to anyone?

They knew nothing. They said nothing. They did nothing. No one had the basic common sense to get out on the street and help the Iraqi people rebuild their lives. It was the morons such as Bremer, Senor and Martinez that midwifed the insurgency.

The Wall Street Journal featured Senor's and Martinez' latest nonsense as "Dynamic Ideas for Iraq." Some dynamism. Too little and too late.

They may have changed the format of their paper but the WSJ's editors have not yet changed the format of their failed Middle East policy or they would not be offering a forum for S & M's puerile observations. (I will have more to say about this hilarious and pathetic column in the Journal.)

Today young Americans are paying the price for Senor's and Martinez' and Bremer's incompetence.

I told you so. Way back in June, 2003.

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Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national and world politics with forty years of personal experience. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639.

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 3, 2007

"WE WUZ ROBBED," SAYS RUDY GIULIANI

"DIRTY TRICKS" START EVEN BEFORE THE CAMPAIGN BEGINS

(CHICAGO)(January 3, 2007) Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, the racket-busting federal prosecutor and baseball fan says his unannounced "campaign" to run for president has been robbed of its Secret Plan. Let the dirty tricks begin! In Florida, of course. Why am I not surprised?

Giuliani's staff claims that Rudy's "secret plan" to run for president has been stolen, copied and returned. The "burglary" seems to have been a pretty sophisticated operation. And Giuliani hasn't even declared as a candidate yet.

RudyGate began with front-page headlines in New York's tabloid press. Giuliani's munchkins claim that a briefcase was removed from a private jet, not returned immediately, and only handed back after the contents had been copied. Frankly, it seems far-fetched. But remind me never to ride on a private jet.

How would someone know just which briefcase to hit? Are Republicans really that expert at cracking briefcases when they can’t crack the insurgency in Iraq? And in Florida of all places? How could someone who worked for the security-paranoid Giuliani be carrying the secret game plan on a trip in Florida? Why would he?

Indeed. Not since Richard Nixon's "Secret Plan to End the War in Viet-Nam" has there been such a commotion over a Secret Plan. For Rudy to Run. And now you know how lawyers create paperwork: the "secret" plan is already 140 pages long and he hasn't even thrown his hat in the ring. With appendices. Bottom line: lawyers like paper. 140 pages is only a down payment on the secret plan. Of course, President Nixon claimed he never had a secret plan. Giuliani has admitted he did.

Florida, of course, is a sleazy place, as well as a sunny locale. And if it had to happen anywhere, it might as well have happened in Florida. The Sunshine State is really Chicago South, a warm weather port for those sailing in an ethically challenged seas. Nevertheless, how would a baggage handler, or someone working for dopey Governor Charlie Crist, know there was gold in that thar' briefcase? Even in Florida there are limits. Still.

Giuliani Partners, Rudy's business base, has a lot of lawyers running around the halls. They have become sloppy since the days when Giuliani locked down City Hall and barred the public.

Sunny Mindel, Giuliani's mouthpiece, says RudyGate was a "dirty trick." How does she know? Has she never heard of "lost luggage?"

The New York Daily News referred to "Rudy's Private Parts," and said the episode was "Bad News." The paper suggested Giuliani hire a security consultant to improve campaign security. Which firm? Giuliani's of course. If only this had happened a few days ago we could have said "Ho, ho, ho." Too late for that.

I have an alternative theory. Like Barack Obama, who writes a book saying he was a teenage cocaine user, someone at Giuliani Partners may be smarter than they appear. Politicians love to get bad news out of the way early, and often are creative in salting the information where it will generate credibility without suspicion.

When I was a teenager in high school I worked weekends at the Waverly Inn, a high-end restaurant in Chesire, Connecticut. The then owner, Fred Roozen, wanted a divorce and his wife wouldn’t give him one. So one day he told her to take his suit to the cleaners. She did what you or I would do: before dropping off the clothes she checked the pockets. And found the "love diary."

I still remember the headline: "Innkeeper Foiled by Love Diary." Fred Roozen hadn't been foiled at all. He had planted the evidence so his wife would have grounds to divorce him, and she did. He was happy as a clam. And a free man at that.

So I think it is equally plausible that someone within the Giuliani campaign planted the "lost" briefcase and then "found" it, and the entire episode may have been a lower-level operation to get the touchy issues out early without tying the candidate to any of the muck. It worked, if that was the plan. I'm not suggesting Rudy knew. I don’t think the higher-ups did. But my theory is as plausible as Mindel's "crooked baggage handler."

Well, here we are in 2007. None of the "major" candidates for president in 2008 has announced yet. And the dirty tricks season, if you can believe Sunny Mindel and reject my theory, has already begun. Happy campaigning everyone. And a "Ho, ho, ho" to you too. Better late than not at all.

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Chicago-based Internet journalist, broadcaster and critic Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2007. Martin covers national politics with forty years of personal experience. Columns also posted at politicalgateway.com. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639.

CONTRARIAN COMMENTARY FOR JANUARY 2, 2007
THE DEATH OF TWO PRESIDENTS: PART TWO, GERALD FORD
WELL DONE, THY GOOD AND FAITHFUL SERVANT
(CHICAGO)(January 2, 2007) Thirty-two years ago I was based in Washington, living in Chicago and had just opened an office in the World Trade Center in New York. Traveling took me around the country and around the world. I saw the disintegration of the Nixon Administration up close.
I first went to Washington in 1966. The "Ev & Jerry Show" as it was called, was on the air. Senate Minority Leader Everett Dirksen and House Minority Leader Gerald Ford went on TV each week to try and hold back the tide of President Johnson's 89th Congress. Mostly they lost, but they kept trying.
Dirksen and Ford were derided as "Midwestern conservatives," a phrase we have heard once again in the past few days. It is a term that deserves more respect today than it receives. The bitter partisanship between Democrats and Republicans, and the bitter divisions within the Republican Party, could use a large dose of Midwestern conservatism. The nation could as well.
As a congressional leader, Ford was seen as amiable and harmless. He manifested poor judgment when he tried to impeach Supreme Court Justice William Douglas. When he was nominated for Vice President the joke was that Nixon had chosen him because congress would then be afraid to impeach Nixon and put Ford in the White House. Nixon was wrong. Still, no one expected very much of Ford.
And then he was president.
And then he pardoned Nixon.
Overnight Ford became an object of derision and hostility. How could be pardon Nixon?
Ford died last week, and now we can look back with 32 years of hindsight. I was wrong. Ford was right. Ford defused the national angst with his controversial pardon.
Of course there are people that are still angry with Ford for pardoning Nixon. Americans gradually forgave him. Our anger rapidly dissipated after the pardon. By 1976 Ford was able to survive a primary challenge, and then rally to almost beat the Democratic nominee Jimmy Carter. We had forgiven and almost elected him.
Then Ford left the scene. Unlike Bush I and Clinton, who can be seen on TV hawking their programs and policies, Ford was mostly silent. He kept to himself. Unlike Carter (with whom I strongly agree on the Middle East), who has also remained active in the public arena, Ford mostly kept his own counsel.
And so when President Ford died this past week Americans honored him as they had never honored him before. Collectively, the American people said, "I'm sorry," and acknowledged the wisdom of his decision to pardon Nixon.
It is a characteristic of this great nation that we often and eventually admit our mistakes, sometimes decades later. Belatedly, we correct the historical record to reflect the reality of what happened.
Ford's wisdom has been vindicated by history. And those of us who were young 32 years ago, and are not-so-young any more, have made amends with the accidental president and with ourselves. Ford's generosity of spirit and practicality of policy returned American to "normal" much sooner than we would have resumed normality if the hunger for revenge against President Nixon had been allowed to fester endlessly.
Congress also performed its constitutional duty. The "Imperial Presidency" was chained. For almost three decades the sound policies that had evolved in the interaction between Ford and the Congress survived. Then we invaded Iraq.
I wish I could say that with the hindsight of forty years in Washington I expect President Bush to be vindicated thirty years henceforth. Sadly, I don't. Although Ford's "right-hand men" Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld returned to the White House with George Bush I and II, the wisdom and humility of the Ford years did not travel with them. Today we face a world made worse by America, not better. We face expansive claims and policies that have made us a laughingstock and created chaos.
Thirty-two years ago, our democracy worked. It continues to work, as the recent election results confirm. The American people are not happy. They removed Nixon when he breached their trust. They have partially removed the Republicans in 2006. And they are waiting.
As for Jerry Ford. My apologies Mr. President. You were right and I was wrong in 1974. You taught me a lesson in wisdom, restraint and humility that I have not forgotten. I only wish others had similarly remembered the lessons of the Ford Years. It will take a long time to get us back to the state of the world and state of the nation you left us in 1977.
________________________________________________.
Andy Martin is the Executive Editor and publisher of ContrarianCommentary.com. © Copyright by Andy Martin 2006. Comments? E-mail: AndyMart20@aol.com. Media contact: (866) 706-2639. Andy is America’s most respected independent foreign policy, military and intelligence analyst. He is a Middle East expert who is Executive Director of the Revolutionary War Research Center. He has spent 36 years in and out of the Middle East and spent much of 2003 in Iraq. He ran as a "Midwestern conservative" for Governor of Illinois in 2006.