Many good comments on the excellent article........ Rebels making Hitler Russia mistake..... A weak force needs to lessen areas of conflict, not take on new 1s......

"Here we are again discussing the Syria situation. As usual HERE...... @AW.com the discussion always seems to come from the perspective that Assad is the victim of actions by America, Israel and others of empire's acolytes. This is, in spite of Assad's Syria being major torture destination, .....for the hapless victims of Neocon efforts to extract "confessions" and other "information" from those the coalition purchased, snatched and "rendered" worldwide. Mayer Arar, poster person of the Syrian torture efforts at empire's behest, has since been exonerated after undergoing a 18 monthe of being pressed by Assad's torturers.

"While testifying at the Guantanamo military commission for alleged child soldier Omar Khadr, FBI agent Robert Fuller testified that Khadr had identified Maher Arar as among the al-Qaeda militants he met while in Afghanistan. On October 7, 2002, Mr. Fuller went to Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan and showed Canadian teenager Omar Khadr a black-and-white photograph of Arar obtained from the FBI office in Massachusetts, and demanded to know if he recognised him. Khadr initially stated that he did not recognise Arar. Upon cross-examination, Mr. Fuller clarified his testimony saying that at first Mr. Khadr could not identify Mr. Arar. Then after giving him a couple minutes Khadr "stated he felt he had seen" Maher Arar[18] at a Kabul safehouse run by Abu Musab al-Suri or Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The validity of Omar Khadr's possible sighting has been seriously questioned due to the time frame of the alleged sighting which was sometime during September or October 2001. Mr. Arar was known to be in North America during this time frame and under surveillance by the RCMP.[19] Khadr's lawyer told Canadian media that Khadr, claiming to be under torture at Bagram Theater Internment Facility, simply told his captors whatever he thought they wanted to hear. Lawyers and advocates familiar with the case immediately dismissed the allegations..." Wikipedia

"MAHER ARAR talks with Amy Goodman:

"MAHER ARAR: Well, let me emphasize here, my case is probably unique in the sense that I was the only Syrian-born Canadian who was sent or renditioned to Syria from U.S. soil. But let me be clear here, there were many victims of rendition of Syrian origin who actually were rendered from Pakistan and other places to Syria. Now, why the — and let me also say that when the American government sent me to Syria, they knew exactly what they were doing. In fact, I can vividly remember what an ex-CIA agent said around 2004 about the rendition program. He basically something said like — if I remember correctly, his is name is Robert Baer. He said, "If you want people to be well interrogated, you send them to Jordan. If you want people to be disappeared, you send them to Egypt. And if you want people to be tortured, you send them to Syria." And that’s exactly what ended up happening. So what this basically says is that whoever took the decision to send me to Syria, they knew, or they basically wanted me to be tortured in order to extract information, what we call today "torture by proxy."

AMY GOODMAN: That was Robert Baer, the ex-CIA agent. So, what do you think this means about the U.S. relationship with Syria today, how much sway the U.S. has, what the U.S. should be doing right now? We just got reports from Damascus and from the border, Amnesty describing this as a scorched earth policy against — well, against the Syrian government’s own people, that the Syrian government, that Bashar al-Assad, is engaging in right now.

MAHER ARAR: Well, the U.S. government has a huge responsibility for a simple reason. The cooperation with the Syrian government, as well as other dictatorships in the Middle East post-9/11, gave some kind of legitimacy to those dictatorships. And it is now — the prime responsibility of the U.S. government is to put the pressure on the Syrian government.

For instance, two things that the U.S. government can do right now. First of all, they have to declare this regime to be illegitimate, and they have forfeited their right to rule. Second, I think they have to press — and we’re here in Canada doing this, I mean, human rights activists and myself are actually pushing our government here to take a lead to refer this matter to the International Criminal Court."

So, somehow, Assad has become the good guys at this time..... I myself am very conflicted about Syria and Assad...... But I won't shed any tears for him if he goes down.... In the end it could be the best thing for those who resist empires "creative Destruction"...!!!

EEII YI YI.......... What a mess..... !!!!!!!! It's even spread here to AW.com ..... YIKES...!!!

"For liberals to tout tolerance & then to embrace the most intolerant people on the plant is both hypocritical & typical!"

Embrace.....??? Because we want to see our government stop KILLING them and their Children.. is a long way from an embrace..... What we embrace is balance and sanity..... Because we want to stop bleeding money chasing Islamic boogey men across the planet, doesn't mean we embrace them.... Even Glen Beck whom I'd rather not embrace........ I certainly do not want Obama to target him and his family with a drone strike....... just because he supports Obama's (political) enemies. "war on terror" It's just a land, money and oil grab dressed up as a noble cause.... for the brain dead....

Sorry to hit that raw spot cs...... I am always willing to admit being wrong... So how DOES one measure such political and cultural saavy..... I'm afraid I do it on intuition.... Would I be wrong ,for example, to conclude that Kentuckians were more enamored of "reality" TV programing, than, say.... C-span? Where would YOU place Senator Paul's constituents on a basis of knowledge of foreign policy history of , say the Middle East region on a list of states..?? Would it be in the top or bottom half..???

"The U.S. Census Bureau maintains lists of many state-by-state comparisons. One of the most interesting is the list of states with the most educated population. Because there is an indirect correlation between education and other metrics, such as poverty and crime, it is useful to compare the top states with the worst states. "

According to the most recent U.S. Census Bureau poll, the states with the highest percentage of residents who have obtained a bachelor's degree or higher are:

1) District of Columbia (48.2%)

2) Massachusetts (38.1%)

3 and 4) Connecticut and Colorado (each with 35.6%)

5) Maryland (35.2%)

The five worst states on the other hand, are:

1) West Virginia (17.1%)

2) Arkansas (18.8%)

3) Mississippi (19.4%)

4) Kentucky (19.7%)
http://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0811/m...

U.S. Passport Holders by State, per capita

Surprise, surprise

Top 10

1. New Jersey
2. Alaska
3. Massachusetts
4. New York
5. California
6. New Hampshire
7. Connecticut
8. Washington
9. Vermont
10. Maryland

Bottom 10

1. Mississippi
2. West Virginia
3. Kentucky
4. Alabama
5. Arkansas
6. Tennessee
7. Louisiana
8. South Carolina
9. Indiana
10. Oklahoma http://www.city-data.com/forum/city-vs-city/13442...

Still wet behind the ears...... &&&& he has heard too much of the America is exceptional BS...... Those mountain folk in Kentucky ain't never seen gay Parie.... all they have is faux nooz..... And other peer entertainment... So it's O.K. to represent your constituents weaknesses ...& ignorance..... for awhile..... It makes them feel loved until it gets old....& harmful... Then tell them the Gawd-Awful truth.... that America has trashed the Bill of Rights and squandered her greatest legacy of freedom, her legacy of innovation too....for the betterment of mankind... her work ethic and her prosperity and become the planets death star wasteland of post productive blightS.... Poverty, debt, disease, crime, mass murdering maniacs and reality TV zombies..... Welcome welcome to the New New America...!!!

I just now worked up the muster to see if my first and admittedly strident and not very politically correct comment survived the night and the day too.... and was not held for mod- eration... and somewhat self chastened ... I clicked... To my great relief... My post has survived, and the tone of the comments remained stern, dubious not much prone to let those particular bygones be bygones....... I can get really wired up when the people who should have known better..... fudge the truth and reality of their and OUR actions and wreck the carnage of war that creates death, misery and oceans of hate.... heartbreak.... and in the ends diminishes all mankind... There is a youtube video [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5AaGVAipGp0 ]of Robert McNamara admitting the Tonkin Gulf attack was bogus.... Just watch and draw your own conclusions.. He kinda lays it between the lines. Another war fought, based on sketchy, uncertain information.... The Vietnam war was another false flag war of choice..... Why were OUR warships there ...??? Why did we declare war..?? What is the real reason...???

I guess to a market guy, it's O.K. to kill KIDS if you send AID....

"Rehman went on to say that there “has been no quiet complicity” from the ruling Pakistani Peoples Party (PPP) about the attacks, disputing US claims that they assume Pakistan’s government just publicly complains about the strikes but gives its “tacit consent.”"

What a lying B-I-T-C-H !!!!!!!!!!!!!

WORSE THAN PROSTITUTES........ They SELL their OWN children to the INFIDEL DRONE GOD OF DEATH.... What a crew........ Lower than pondscum..... Wins worlds most corrupt country award!!!

I think Zadari may have colluded with you know who to get her killed and him elected........ There seems no end to the venality there in that place............ IK !! The only hope 2B seen there in decades...