Month: September 2007

Loose Nukes Followup

by tristero

If blogging has any genuinely innovative quality about it, it’s surely its ability to, on occasion at least, rapidly deepen one’s understanding of an issue by attracting commentary and links from intelligent, informed people. In some 42 posts to my discussion of Larry Johnson’s alarm about the loose nukes, a large collection of links were offered by readers to help make sense of what happpened.

Andrew Foland, a physics professor runs a blog, Nuclear Mangos, that is motivated by “the incredible amount of lies & hyperbole on the Iran situation of early 2006. The blog title is to remind you constantly of the quality of minds in charge of our nuclear security today.” He called our attention to this post of his:

Myself, I lean to the explanation that this was in fact a simple but terrible screw-up. There are surely already plenty of American nuclear weapons on board subs and carriers in the Middle East, and even if some new ones were needed, there are plenty of ways to get them there without flying them loaded on B-52’s across the country, and subsequently having the news leaked. I honestly believe they have the operational capability to carry out the real thing in secret. (I can’t totally dismiss the idea that this was meant as a message, though usually sending such messages do not involve imposing radiation risk on civilian areas of the United States.)

Josh Marshall takes much the same view, based on his inquiries (perhaps even to Andrew Foland and his colleagues).

Professor Foland also links to this post from Strategic Security Blog by Hans M. Kristensen which addresses a disturbing trend (in comments):

The really important implication is beyond the immediate: The United States is in the beginning of a transition to a deep integration of nuclear and conventional capabilities. The Navy has already proposed, and the Air Force is about to propose, replacing some nuclear warheads on long-range ballistic missiles with conventional warheads. From outside the weapons will look the same.

The long-range bombers are already highly dual-capable and U.S. B-52s have been used repeatedly to launch conventional Air Launched Cruise Missiles against high-value targets. The Minot bomber was on its way to Barksdale, but it could hypothetically have been on its way to Iraq or – in a potential future conflict – North Korea, Iran or China with nuclear cruise missiles.

If the B-52 incident tells us that the military’s command and control system cannot ensure with 100% certainty which weapons are nuclear and which ones are not, imagine the implications of the wrong weapon being used in a crisis or war. “Sorry Mr. President, we thought it was conventional.”

I don’t have time to comment on these links, but they also attracted my attention as ones that improve our understanding of this extremely bizarre and dangerous event. Enjoy (if that is the right word) and thanks, all, for taking the trouble to comment.

Total WonKerr: How’d Those Nukes Get There?

ArmsControlWonk: US Bomber Accidentally Transports Nukes

james_nicoll: B-52 carried nuclear armed cruise missiles by mistake

One final thought: Perhaps it really was a mistake. If so, it was a mistake in keeping with the mistake of not paying attention to the incoming info about bin Laden in Summer ’01, the mistake of not preparing for Katrina, and so on. The notion that this is “mere” incompetence does not reassure me in the slightest. “Ooops” gets no one off the hook. Heads should roll over this.

Wanna bet it happens, esp. if loyal Bushies were the fuckups?

The Truth Dribbles Out

by tristero

Blumenthal:

On Sept. 18, 2002, CIA director George Tenet briefed President Bush in the Oval Office on top-secret intelligence that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction, according to two former senior CIA officers. Bush dismissed as worthless this information from the Iraqi foreign minister, a member of Saddam’s inner circle, although it turned out to be accurate in every detail. Tenet never brought it up again.

Nor was the intelligence included in the National Intelligence Estimate of October 2002, which stated categorically that Iraq possessed WMD. No one in Congress was aware of the secret intelligence that Saddam had no WMD as the House of Representatives and the Senate voted, a week after the submission of the NIE, on the Authorization for Use of Military Force in Iraq. The information, moreover, was not circulated within the CIA among those agents involved in operations to prove whether Saddam had WMD.

Not even Claude Rains could pretend to be surprised by any of this, but that is no reason to get cynical. Everyone with half a brain – or less – knew Nixon was lying through his teeth long before the “smoking gun” was found. It wasn’t the damning evidence on that tape so much as the gathering momentum of the country’s disgust with the First Crook. Ditto with Blumenthal’s article.

Is it the final straw? Probably not. But it is impossible for anyone anymore to pretend that Bush wasn’t lying about the infamous 16 words. As for Bush lying to himself…it won’t wash. He knew. By the time Tenet briefed Bush about Sabri, two things prevented Bush from behaving like a sane human being. First, he was in too deep. By September ’02, Bush had geared up the country for war – the vote in Congress to come, the UN and the inspections, they were just meaningless diversions. The die was cast and nothing would stop Bush from going to war, let alone something as trivial as contradictory and credible intelligence that there wasn’t even the shadow of a casus belli.

Second, by 2002, Bush’s psychopathic personality was at its most floridly deranged. Riding incredibly high opinion polls, convinced God was speaking to him, having gotten away with stupendous lies and irresponsible behavior throughout his entire career, Bush was incapable of anything but lying when he dismissed the report from Tenet. But simply because he was at the height of mania, don’t make the mistake of thinking he didn’t know where the truth lay. Oh, he knew, all right.

But the truth, George W. Bush knows, can be magically nullified through the exercise of sufficient power. That – and only that – is his mad delusion, a delusion nurtured by his toxic upbringing where his family shielded him from the consequences of his failures and incompetence. It is a delusion that has led to the pointless suffering and death of hundreds of thousands of people. But as deluded as he was, and is, he knew Sabri was telling the truth. And that is why Bush made sure no one found out about it until long afterwards

Bush Like Big Bang Bang

by tristero

Larry Johnson:

Barksdale Air Force Base is being used as a jumping off point for Middle East operations. Gee, why would we want cruise missile nukes at Barksdale Air Force Base. Can’t imagine we would need to use them in Iraq. Why would we want to preposition nuclear weapons at a base conducting Middle East operations? His final point was to observe that someone on the inside obviously leaked the info that the planes were carrying nukes. A B-52 landing at Barksdale is a non-event. A B-52 landing with nukes. That is something else.

Now maybe there is an innocent explanation for this? I can’t think of one.

Innocent? No. Childish? Yes.

Imo, Bush, et al are just aching to be the first to drop the Big One since Truman. You think they’ll let a pipsqueak Korean get there first? Or India/Pakistan? Hell, no!

Oh, come on, tristero. That’s just bizarre paranoia. Surely, you’re not implying that Bush’s is so anxious to drop The Bomb that his administration is simply scouring the world to find an excuse, are you? Not even Bush – hell, not even Cheney! – are that insanely immature.

Oh yes, they are and that’s exactly what I’m saying. And I’ve been saying it for quite a while now. If you think he isn’t that childishly insane, you haven’t seriously attended to Bush’s (and his cronies’) numerous examples of seriously infantile and irresponsible behavior and statements. Hey, remember when Bush called the Afghanistan war a “crusade?” Or “Bring ’em on!” Or “joking” that it would be a helluva lot easier to rule if the US was a dictatorship and Bush was the dictator? Or the strutting codpiece?

But let’s not argue about this. You think Bush is too much of a grown-up not to lust for the big bang-bang, I disagree, but I won’t argue. Because there’s something more important afoot. And that is finding a good reason for the transportation of nuclear weapons to a military base conducting Middle East operations.

[UPDATE: Good to know Bush is on top of this:

he incident was so serious that President Bush and Defense Secretary Robert Gates were quickly informed and Gates has asked for daily briefings on the Air Force probe.

The only questions is this: Are they investigating the “mistake” or the leak?]

Did The Escalation Work?

by tristero

UPDATED

No, of course not. But the Bush administration, with the collusion of the msm, is doing its level best to create the impression that maybe We Don’t Really Know. The strategy worked when Bush got us into this mess. Hey, y’never can tell!

Here’s Katie Couric:

Many more Iraqis have joined the Iraqi Security Forces in the overwhelmingly Sunni Anbar province. Despite mutual distrust, stemming from the power shift after Saddam Hussein’s Baathist government fell, Sunnis and Shiites are working together in the ISF to fight al Qaeda in Iraq.

While Hussein was in power, Sunnis were in positions of authority over the Shiites, and now are fearful that the majority of Shiites will seek revenge. Iraqi Shiites fear a return of Sunni power in Iraq.

However, Sunnis in Anbar continue to join the ISF.

“The spike in police has really been significant,” Couric said. “The incidents in Iraq have gone down dramatically.”

Security and stability have improved in Iraq, but basic services remain in disrepair.

Sounds good, dunnit? Hands across the Great Islamic Divide – banding together to fight a common enemy. And it’s working, Katie Couric says so.

Well, maybe not. The Independent Commission on Security Forces in Iraq:

Iraq’s Interior Ministry is regarded as “dysfunctional” and sectarian” and the National Police should be “disbanded and reorganized,” according to an independent report obtained by CNN.

The report, authored by the Independent Commission on Security Forces in Iraq, fires stinging criticism at Iraqi security forces but also includes promising words for the country’s military…

The Interior Ministry and the National Police force it operates have long been regarded by observers as being infiltrated by sectarian Shiite militias.

“Such fundamental flaws present a serious obstacle to achieving the levels of readiness, capability, and effectiveness in police and border security forces that are essential for internal security and stability in Iraq.”

“Sectarianism in its units undermines its ability to provide security; the force is not viable in its current form. The National Police should be disbanded and reorganized…”

The report says the Iraqi Police Service “is incapable today of providing security at a level sufficient to protect Iraqi neighborhoods from insurgents and sectarian violence.”

But what accounts for such profoundly discrepant conclusions? It’s obvious, or should be:

The Pentagon said Wednesday it does not agree with the report’s recommendation that the Iraqi National Police be disbanded.

Get it? Couric, of course, wouldn’t be able to move anywhere in Iraq without the active participation of US armed forces. A newcomer to Iraq, Couric and crew simply were shown what they wanted her to see.

Need some convincing? Then see, for example, Lara Logan’s report from Basra. Logan, of course, has spent a good deal of time in Iraq, and needn’t depend upon US Army escorts to do her job:

British troops were handing over their base at Basra Palace the very next morning to the Iraqi Army’s 10th Division and withdrawing to a British air base on the outskirts of the city.

While on the way to see the local governor, Logan reports that their lives were in the hands of his uncle and personal security force – the only men Gov. Mohammed al-Waili trusts in a city that’s become a battleground for rival militias that have infiltrated the police force and tried repeatedly to kill him.

“Those policemen outside the front of your building, do you trust them” asked Logan.

“Not all of them,” al-Waili replied. [Emphasis added]

Even in this short excerpt, the complexity of the situation is apparent. No simplistic conflation of “the enemy” into Al Qaeda. The vertigo-inducing situation includes withdrawing British troops, an Iraqi governor – aka, warlord – with a private army and a police force infiltrated by “rival militias.” Note the plural.

Let’s face it. The only incontrovertibly genuine outcome of Bush’s escalation is that additional people have died or been mutilated at rates near the highest since Bush’s invasion. Iraqis and Americans alike. (And by the way, not even Bill “The Gambler” Bennett would bet much on the Iraqi army’s increasing effectivenesss.)

Short version: It’s more chaotic in Iraq than you can possibly imagine. It’s a civil war, not between two sides, but dozens. It is far beyond the control of the American forces there, let alone the Maliki I-use-the-term-loosely government. And that things look marginally – and temporarily- better where Couric was permitted to venture merely highlights the deterioration elsewhere.

[Update: Juan Cole on Anbar province, where Couric reported progress.]

Serious Madmen

by digby

Glenn Greenwald takes Michael Ledeen downtown today in a thoroughly satisfying fashion. Despite the fact that he is an embarrassment on virtually every level, and almost certifiably nuts, he is considered “serious” by people like Fred Hiatt, who Glenn quotes today:

We’re not part of that [bomb Iran]camp, though we consider its members saner than many of the statements of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Right-o. Ahmadinejad is a holocaust denier and desires the destruction of Israel. Insane for sure.

What do you suppose he would call this?

March 10, 2003

A Theory

What if there’s method to the Franco-German madness?

Assume, for a moment, that the French and the Germans aren’t thwarting us out of pique, but by design, long-term design. Then look at the world again, and see if there’s evidence of such a design.

Like everyone else, the French and the Germans saw that the defeat of the Soviet Empire projected the United States into the rare, almost unique position of a global hyperpower, a country so strong in every measurable element that no other nation could possibly resist its will. The “new Europe” had been designed to carve out a limited autonomy for the old continent, a balance-point between the Americans and the Soviets. But once the Soviets were gone, and the Red Army melted down, the European Union was reduced to a combination theme park and free-trade zone. Some foolish American professors and doltish politicians might say — and even believe — that henceforth “power” would be defined in economic terms, and that military power would no longer count. But cynical Europeans know better.

They dreaded the establishment of an American empire, and they sought for a way to bring it down.

If you were the French president or the German chancellor, you might well have done the same.

How could it be done? No military operation could possibly defeat the United States, and no direct economic challenge could hope to succeed. That left politics and culture. And here there was a chance to turn America’s vaunted openness at home and toleration abroad against the United States. So the French and the Germans struck a deal with radical Islam and with radical Arabs: You go after the United States, and we’ll do everything we can to protect you, and we will do everything we can to weaken the Americans.

The Franco-German strategy was based on using Arab and Islamic extremism and terrorism as the weapon of choice, and the United Nations as the straitjacket for blocking a decisive response from the United States.

This required considerable skill, and total cynicism, both of which were in abundant supply in Paris and Berlin. Chancellor Shroeder gained reelection by warning of American warmongering, even though, as usual, America had been attacked first. And both Shroeder and Chirac went to great lengths to support Islamic institutions in their countries, even when — as in the French case — it was in open violation of the national constitution.

[…]

It sounds fanciful, to be sure. But the smartest people I know have been thoroughly astonished at recent French and German behavior. This theory may help understand what’s going on. I now believe that I was wrong to forecast that the French would join the war against Iraq at the last minute, having gained every possible economic advantage in the meantime. I think Chirac will oppose us before, during, and after the war, because he has cast his lot with radical Islam and with the Arab extremists. He isn’t doing it just for the money — although I have no doubt that France is being richly rewarded for defending Saddam against the civilized countries of the world — but for higher stakes. He’s fighting to end the feared American domination before it takes stable shape.

If this is correct, we will have to pursue the war against terror far beyond the boundaries of the Middle East, into the heart of Western Europe. And there, as in the Middle East, our greatest weapons are political: the demonstrated desire for freedom of the peoples of the countries that oppose us.

No, that isn’t the ranting of some lunatic on late night radio. That’s our friend Ledeen, the “Freedom Scholar” at the American Enterprise Institute, writing in the pages of the flagship conservative magazine The National Review.

He’s one of the serious people who are now advocating that we must bomb Iran immediately, a “crowd” which Hiatt doesn’t consider himself a part of but which he nonetheless doesn’t see as insane. Yet this crowd listens to “Iran expert” Michael Ledeen, who as Glenn points out, speaks no Persian and has never set foot in the country. But then why should he? He believes that France and Germany (and God knows who else) are involved in a massive conspiracy with Iran, Iraq and al Qaeda to destroy the United States.

I don’t know about you, but that sounds just as insane as anything Ahmadinejad ever said and much more dangerous. We actually do have nuclear weapons. Lots of ’em.

And, by the way, don’t think this is just one guy’s paranoid fantasy. This notion of taking the GWOT into the heart of Europe is quite fashionable in right wing circles. Here’s Mark Steyn making the argument from another angle, with one of the right’s premiere journalists:

PAUL GIGOT, FOX HOST: “America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It” forecasts a dark future in which the nations of Old Europe fall to Islam fundamentalism. And the United States remains the last Western democracy.

Earlier, I spoke to the author, columnist Mark Steyn.

GIGOT: In your book, you write that much of what we loosely call the “Western World will not survive the 21st Century. And much of it will effectively disappear within our lifetimes, including many, if not most, European countries”, end quote. That sounds like a doomsday scenario.

MARK STEYN, COLUMNIST AND AUTHOR OF “AMERICA ALONE”: It is. I tried to be cheerful. But it is hard to be cheerful about apocalyptic-type stuff. And this is what it is.

Basically, 17 European countries have what demographers call lowest-load fertility, from which no society ever recovered. That means they are basically not having enough babies.

And the way Europe is set up, they have these unsustainable social programs and welfare. And they imported the babies that they didn’t have. They imported them essentially from the North Africa and the Middle East.

So we’re seeing one of the fastest population transformations in history, whereby an aging ethnic European population is being replaced by a Muslim population. And the Muslims understand that, in fact, Europe, as they see it, is the colony now.

This pithy remark brings it all together:

You can understand why the Quai d’Orsay is relaxed about Iran becoming the second Muslim nuclear power. As things stand, France is on course to be the third. You heard it here first.

As far as I can tell, these guys are picking them off one by one. First it was Iraq. Now Iran. And as soon as we’re done with them, we’re going to invade France. What could go wrong?

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By Any Means Necessary

by digby

I have a new post up over at The Big Con about the Republican assault on the spirit on democracy and why they will keep doing it even though Bush had virtually destroyed their reputation. (Hint: they don’t care about their reputation.)

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Interesting

by tristero

Gallup Poll, May 2007:

Which brings to mind Pastor Ray Mummert’s immortal complaint regarding opposition to the advocacy of “intelligent design” creationism in science classes:

We’ve been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of the culture.

Well, yes.

h/t to recent print editions of Reports of the National Center for Science Education and Skeptical Inquirer.

Swift Balloting 2008

by digby

In case there’s anyone who doubts that this gambit to change California’s electoral college votes is anything but a standard, GOP dirty trick, this should put them to rest:

Lawyers behind a California ballot proposal that could benefit the 2008 Republican presidential nominee have ties to a Texas homebuilder who financed attacks on Democrat John Kerry’s Vietnam War record in the 2004 presidential campaign. Charles H. Bell and Thomas Hiltachk’s law firm banked nearly $65,000 in fees from a California-based political committee funded almost solely by Bob J. Perry that targeted Democrats in 2006. Perry, a major Republican donor, contributed nearly $4.5 million to the group Swift Boat Veterans for Truth that made unsubstantiated but damaging attacks on Kerry three years ago. The Perry-financed committee in California, the Economic Freedom Fund, continued to spend money this year, mostly on legal expenses tied to an ongoing legal dispute in Indiana over phone calls made to voters in 2006. It lists the Sacramento law office’s address as its home and its Web site directs contributions to the firm, Bell, McAndrews & Hiltachk. In addition, Bell serves as the committee’s treasurer. Hiltachk has been pushing a proposal to revamp the way California awards its electoral votes, a change Democrats claim would rig the 2008 race. He and Bell are the sole officers of a new political committee, Californians for Equal Representation, that is raising money to place the plan on the ballot in June. Their success could hinge on whether they get the financial backing to collect more than 400,000 petition signaturesneeded to qualify the proposal for the ballot. And while Perry has not donated to their cause, his wealth and connections make him a potential financier for a drive that could cost more than $1 million. Running a statewide campaign would cost millions more. Democrats are working to defeat the effort and already have lined up supporters such as Hollywood producer Stephen Bing, whose credits include the 2000 “Get Carter” remake with Sylvester Stallone. Supporters say the vote-change plan could open a new era of fairness in presidential contests. But the law firm’s link to Perry and other Republican candidates and causes will make it difficult to separate the proposal from partisan politics. Bell, McAndrews & Hiltachk is one of the most politically involved law firms in the state. According to a news story on its Web site, Bell keeps a life-sized cardboard image of President Bush in his office. Federal records show the firm does legal work for a host of political committees, most with Republican or business ties.

They really couldn’t be more obvious.

I suspect this is as much mind fuck as anything, and perhaps a simple desire to force Democrats to spend money on something they don’t want to spend it on, but you cannot take that for granted. These people have no compunction about cheating. They’ve shown that. Look what it got us in 2000. And if they succeed again, the press will just laugh and giggle about haircuts and cleavage and tell everyone to get over it. Just like last time. And the time before. And the time before that.

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Gettin’ Jiggy Wid It

by digby

Please just shoot me. I can’t take any more:

Bush Sees Possible Troop Cuts in Iraq

President Bush raised the possibility Monday of U.S. troop cuts in Iraq if security continues to improve, traveling here secretly to assess the war before a showdown with Congress.

The president was joined by his war cabinet [when did the press start calling it his “war cabinet”?] and military commanders at an unprecedented meeting in Iraq over eight hours at this dusty military base in the heart of Anbar province, 120 miles west of Baghdad.

Bush did not say how large a troop withdrawal might be possible or whether it might occur before next spring when the first of the additional 30,000 troops he ordered to Iraq this year are to start coming home anyway. He emphasized that any cut would depend upon progress.

Gosh. I’m all on pins and needles. What ever do you think will happen?

I say to the President, respectfully, pick whatever number you wish. You do not want to lose the momentum. But certainly, in the 160,000 plus — say 5,000 — could begin to redeploy and be home to their families and loved ones no later than Christmas of this year.

Here, once again for your reading pleasure, is me, from last week:

So, here’s how I see the narrative: The surge is working so well that we can bring home 5,000 troops to fight the war on Christmas. But we mustn’t set forth any timetables beyond that because things are really starting to move politically over there. Haven’t you heard? Everybody’s saying that the Prime Minister is on the rocks. That signals political change — just what we’ve been waiting for! Hallalujah. All we need to do is hang on just a bit longer to see how that all pans out.

I know everyone knows this. I get that I’m just recycling the obvious. But the press knows they are being manipulated and yet they continue to write stories like this because that’s how they perceive their jobs. They report facts — and the fact is that the president did say this ridiculous swill. But there’s something terribly wrong when a large portion of the public, the elite media and all politicians see through this completely — and yet everyone pretends they don’t. Sure there are commentators and bloggers and some others who point out that this is complete nonsense, but it doesn’t matter. The president and his allies know that the media, with its outmoded journalistic conventions and useless code of “objectivity” will report all these “facts” with enough credulity that a good portion of the public will buy in and that’s all it takes.

These slow motion trainwrecks are all too familiar by now. Krugman knows it better than anyone:

In February 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell, addressing the United Nations Security Council, claimed to have proof that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. He did not, in fact, present any actual evidence, just pictures of buildings with big arrows pointing at them saying things like “Chemical Munitions Bunker.” But many people in the political and media establishments swooned: they admired Mr. Powell, and because he said it, they believed it.

Mr. Powell’s masters got the war they wanted, and it soon became apparent that none of his assertions had been true.

Until recently I assumed that the failure to find W.M.D., followed by years of false claims of progress in Iraq, would make a repeat of the snow job that sold the war impossible. But I was wrong. The administration, this time relying on Gen. David Petraeus to play the Colin Powell role, has had remarkable success creating the perception that the “surge” is succeeding, even though there’s not a shred of verifiable evidence to suggest that it is.

It’s hard to believe they’re trying this again and it’s even harder to believe they’ll get away with it. But here we are.

Update: Or as Atrios says…

Update II: Oh my God. From Greenwald:

Our country’s authoritarians are glorifying the Leader today like it’s 2003, all for his very brave (and covert) sneaking into Iraq. Jules Crittenden (cousin of David Frum) uses language typically reserved for Jesus to describe Bush’s every movement:

NPR reporting he’s landed, enroute to an econmic summit in Australia. Web reports now coming in. AP: He’s in Anbar, landed at Al-Asad. . . . he’s expected to meet with al-Maliki and Sunni tribal leaders who’ve joined the United States and the Iraqi government against al-Qaeda.

He is risen. This is the same Jules Crittenden who, back in January on the day of the President’s speech unveiling the Surge, began his post this way: “George Bush will address us tonight, and show us the way forward.” He will show us the way forward. Similarly, Blue Texan notes that Glenn Reynolds — in addition to linking to the Crittenden post above — also linked to a post which began this way: “Unlike the last Commander-in-chief, is there any doubt that the men and women who serve our country love President Bush.” Finally, Fred Kagan, writing in National Review, declared that Bush’s trip “should be recognized as at least the Gettysburg of this war” — at least — and that the Leader’s Glorious Visit “could well mark a key turning point in the war in Iraq and the war on terror.” He is Jesus. He is Lincoln. He is beloved by Our Troops. He “shows us the way forward.” He is Our Leader.

This is an under appreciated aspect of the working the refs tactic. By contrast to this delusional clap-trap, the MSM believes itself to be harsh and skeptical. Neat, huh?

Of course, many wingnuts believe this stuff completely. They yearn for the codpiece with every fiber of their being.

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White Flour!

by digby

Via Perlstein, here’s a hilarious story about a Klan rally. For real.

Saturday May 26th the VNN Vanguard Nazi/KKK group attempted to host a hate rally to try to take advantage of the brutal murder of a white couple for media and recruitment purposes.

Unfortunately for them the 100th ARA (Anti Racist Action) clown block came and handed them their asses by making them appear like the asses they were.

Alex Linder the founder of VNN and the lead organizer of the rally kicked off events by rushing the clowns in a fit of rage, and was promptly arrested by 4 Knoxville police officers who dropped him to the ground when he resisted and dragged him off past the red shiny shoes of the clowns.

“White Power!” the Nazi’s shouted, “White Flour?” the clowns yelled back running in circles throwing flour in the air and raising separate letters which spelt “White Flour”.

“White Power!” the Nazi’s angrily shouted once more, “White flowers?” the clowns cheers and threw white flowers in the air and danced about merrily.

“White Power!” the Nazi’s tried once again in a doomed and somewhat funny attempt to clarify their message, “ohhhhhh!” the clowns yelled “Tight Shower!” and held a solar shower in the air and all tried to crowd under to get clean as per the Klan’s directions.

At this point several of the Nazi’s and Klan members began clutching their hearts as if they were about to have a heart attack. Their beady eyes bulged, and the veins in their tiny narrow foreheads beat in rage. One last time they screamed “White Power!”

The clown women thought they finally understood what the Klan was trying to say. “Ohhhhh…” the women clowns said. “Now we understand…”, “WIFE POWER!” they lifted the letters up in the air, grabbed the nearest male clowns and lifted them in their arms and ran about merrily chanting “WIFE POWER! WIFE POWER! WIFE POWER!”

This is the funniest thing I’ve read in years. It’s perfect, sublime.

And if this part is true, then it makes my year:

After the VNNers left in their shiny SUVs to go back to Alabama and all the other states that they were from the clowns and counter demonstrators began to march out of the area chanting ‘WHOSE STREETS? OUR STREETS!”

But the cops stopped the clowns and counter protestors. “Hey, do you want an escort” an African-American police officer on a motorcycle asked. “Yes” a clown replied. “We are walking to Market Square in the center of town to celebrate.”

The police officers got in front of the now anti racist parade and blocked the entire road for the march through the heart of Knoxville. An event called imagination station was taking place and over 15,000 thousand students and their parents were in town that weekend. Many of them cheered as the clowns, Knoxvillians and counter protestors marched through the heart of Knoxville singing and laughing at the end of the Nazi’s first attempt at having a rally in Knoxville.