I’m from the Government and I’m Here to Help

Yesterday:

THE PRESIDENT: Yes — what President Chirac and others have said is they want to make sure that the transfer of sovereignty to the interim government is a real transfer. And that’s what we want. We want there to be a complete and real transfer of sovereignty so that the Iraqi citizens realize the fate of their country is now their responsibility. And we’ll be there to help. And we’ll help in a variety of ways.

Isn’t there a joke about this? The joke is definitely on anyone who believes we invaded a country just to hand power to its citizens with no strings attached.
Anyway, here we are five weeks from the “transfer of sovereignty” and coalition of the willing leaders are busy working out the final minor details. Like whether or not the Iraqi government will have any say over the 138,000 foreign troops within the country.
Looks like we’ve got everything set to go.

Marketing to Fads

So Coca Cola unveils a new Coca-Cola C2, “with half the carbohydrates, calories and sugar of regular cola, and “all the great taste” of Coca-Cola.
Seems to me if you are really worried about the above, you’d drink Diet Coke.

Away from Blogging

I’ve been away from the computer for much of the past few days. Went to the mountains one day and have been helping a friend prepare a house to move into the others. Strangely, he didn’t have a blogging station set up in between the ladders, sander, saws, and paint cans. Anyway, house builders sure could save a lot of work if they got things right the first time so no one ever had to mess with this type of work.

“Heroes in Error”

It’s hard to get a grasp on the latest Ahmed Chalabi saga. This Robin Wright piece reads like an obituary, but the TV shot of the busted Chalabi picture in yesterday’s “raid” seemed a bit photo-optish to me.
Anyway, you gotta love one of Chalabi’s classics:

“We are heroes in error,” he told the Daily Telegraph of London in February. “As far as we’re concerned, we’ve been entirely successful. That tyrant Saddam is gone and the Americans are in Baghdad. What was said before is not important.”

Great line. With material like that, Chalabi he can always hook up with a talk radio slot at WGOP if all else fails for him. He’d fit right in.

Iraqi Moses?

U.S. troops and Iraqi police raid the offices of Governing Council member Ahmad Chalabi. A breaking of ties?
Robert Dreyfuss is suspicious:

In other words, it�s all a big con game. The still-neocon-dominated Pentagon�which this week stopped funding Chalabi�s INC �is playing its last card, hoping that it can boost Chalabi�s sagging fortunes by pretending to sever ties with him. That, the neocons hope, will allow Chalabi to strengthen his ties to Sistani, the king-making mullah who, they hope, holds Iraq�s fate in his wrinkled hands.

Who knows. But comments like this do make one wonder:

He [Chalabi] also said he believed his deepening standoff with U.S. authorities over exactly how much power will be handed over to Iraqis when the country regains sovereignty on July 1 had been an impulse behind the raids.
“Let my people go. Let my people be free. It is time for the Iraqi people to run their affairs,” an impassioned Chalabi said.

That does sound a little staged by a man who supposedly just had his house raided by the “Iraqi people.”

Corpse Care

Well, at least we didn’t hang them from bridges:

ABCNEWS has obtained two new photos taken at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq showing Spc. Charles Graner and Spc. Sabrina Harman posing over the body of a detainee who was allegedly beaten to death by CIA or civilian interrogators in the prison’s showers. The detainee’s name was Manadel al-Jamadi.

Cuing the moral relativists. . . .