Allies seen snubbing W on Iraq aid

[cal04]

The White House isn't counting on getting military help in Iraq from antagonistic allies until after the U.S. elections, if at all, a U.S. official told the Daily News. Underscoring Democrat John Kerry's claim last spring that some world leaders said they'd prefer that President Bush be turned out of office, well-equipped powers like Russia, China, France and Germany won't offer to send troops to protect UN officials working to hold elections in Iraq in January.

"There is no way anybody is going to step up before the election. It's personal enmity toward the President. They can't stand him," said the official, who asked not to be named."Somebody should step up and protect the UN election officials as they try to promote democratic elections in a sovereign nation that had been run by a despot. ... It's a shame, regardless of how we got there," the official added.

To help fill the void, the U.S. will turn to countries trying to build alliances with the West, such as Uzbekistan, to provide some troops to help protect the UN staffers.A French official denied that France, other NATO allies and world powers weren't helping in Iraq, pointing to plans to train Iraqi police and pay to support the upcoming vote.
The French official accused the White House of trying to open old wounds to try to win Bush votes. "They are spinning for domestic political reasons," the official said. "If Kerry is elected we wouldn't send troops either. We don't need more targets in Iraq."
The issue will likely come up in private talks with world leaders when Bush holds meetings coinciding with this week's opening session of the UN General Assembly.

Bush will address the UN Tuesday and hold meetings with the leaders of India, Pakistan, Japan and Afghanistan and UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. He's to meet Thursday in Washington with new Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.

http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/233620p-200532c.html

[TaleWgnDg]

1. do I smell a re-enactment of the U.S. A. draft?

========================================
"You're doin a superb job!" -- GWBush
referring to Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld's
abilities in Iraq during the first week of publicized
abuse of Iraqi prisoners by U.S. military, U.S.
intelligence, and U.S. private contractors,
May 10, 2004, The Pentagon, Washington, D.C.
press conference, after cries that Rumsfeld
should resign (or be fired).
========================================
Q: Senator Jack Reed (Dem, RI): "If you were shown
a video of a United States Marine or an American
citizen in control of a foreign power, in a cell block,
naked with a bag over their head, squatting with their
arms uplifted for 45 minutes, would you describe that
as a good interrogation technique or a violation of
the Geneva Convention?"

A: Marine Gen. Peter Pace, the vice chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff: "I would describe it as a violation."

A: Paul D. Wolfowitz, the deputy secretary of defense: "What
you've described to me sounds to me like a violation of the
Geneva Convention."

Thursday, May 13, 2004, Senate Armed Services Committee hearings
========================================

[JoFerret]

2. Trying to influence the outcome of the election

Demonstrating BushCo's inability to work with others, build coalitions. The world wants Bush gone and for good reason. His policies make everyone worse off. Here we have a possibly dying planet or at least climate changes that will adversely affect all of us eventually and millions in the next few years and we are blathering about with heads in the sand without leadership. If only global warming could select out and shrivel just those who make sane and scientific debate on the threat to the planet possible.

[TaleWgnDg]

3. it's been my personal belief that GWBush and Company . . .

started Bush's War Against Saddam to toss the mid-term elections in 2002 into the Republican camp. The timing was VERY suspect. There was no legitimate cause to go to war. We were in Afghanistan chasing Osama -- why Iraq?

There was no logical rationale then and there remains no logical rationale now to have gone to war against Saddam except for illogical and dark reasons . . . and unfortunately the outcome to present has darkened even more as Bush and Company continues to place our young men and women in harm's way UNNECESSARILY!

==================================================
"(Deputy Secty of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, y)ou come
before this committee . . . having seriously undermined
your credibility over a number of years now," Senator
Hillary Rodham Clinton said. "When it comes to making
estimates or predictions about what will occur in Iraq, and
what will be the costs in lives and money, . . . you have made
numerous predictions, time and time again, that have turned
out to be untrue and were based on faulty assumptions."
-- Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, addressing Paul
Wolfowitz, who appeared b4 the Senate Armed Services
Committee, May 13, 2004.
==================================================

[Eloriel]

10. That's not the REASON he started the Iraq War, but the fact that

he rushed it certainly had to do with the timing of the 2002 election.

The real reasons for Iraq are a little more complex (and perhaps more sinister) than that, but some of them are found in the Project for a New Century's (PNAC's) astonishing blueprint for American Empire.

[Norquist Nemesis]

4. Why those dirty rotten traitors!

The upcoming week is going to be very interesting. Who's got the popcorn!

[The Zanti Regent]

5. I hope the UN delegates walk out on Bush en masse

Nice to see him try and handle that, talking to an empty hall except for Israel and a bunch of tiny ex-Soviet states...

[readmylips]

8. Gawd...First thing that went through my mind...

UN members, please walk out if you want bush to lose the elections. Give the bastard what he gives the world; the backside.

[wildflower]

9. Unfortunately...

There were plenty of Americans willing to say "Screw the U.N. and pass the freedom fries" before...I hope that's changed.

-wildflower

[u2spirit]

6. Buhco will seize on this sentence

"If Kerry is elected we wouldn't send troops either. We don't need more targets in Iraq."


I think Bush will use this in the debate(s) to say that Kerry's "Iraq plan" is flawed.

[Inland]

7. Bush I said it was great he had personal relationships with

world leaders. It was a big asset. Bush II has alienated the others so much that they would do anything to spite him, and yet it isn't a reason to vote Kerry.

[St. Jarvitude]

11. OMG, way too tired. I misread the title completely

"Aliens seen snubbing W on Iraq aid"

I was going to ask which planet they were from so I could take a looooooooooooong vacation there.

[struggle4progress]

12. kick

:kick: