The CNN reporter said he was in the wrong neighborhood at the wrong time. Yeah, right.
I wonder if he'll get his money, jewelry, IDs and passports back.

This did make the news. The way it was spun was that this guy is not a key player, they weren't sure who he was, and he was in the wrong part of town at the wrong time. It's not that no one was in charge of the operation. The commanders, who cower behind concrete barracades since they long ago discovered you need to get lots of concrete between yourself and Iraq, followed their orders like the good soldiers they are. I guess it's going to be easier to use our weapons, which really aren't good at crowd control, to slaughter wantonly when it devolves into a civil war.

I've got the John McCain political advertisement on A&E right now. It's a nice way to blunt the republi-con attacks on his character when they come his way in '08. Maybe A&E will do one on the idiot son's background? They can start at the Yale days with him laying in his own vomit, and show his consistency by showing the same thing at Harvard. They can again show him laying in his own vomit while in the guard, forcing his girlfriend to get an abortion. There can be some lovely suggestive slow-mo scenes of when he was drunk and having man-dates (these have only been alluded to, so they should be really kind of dream like to differentiate between proven reality and the covered-up reality). The part of his life where he fucked-up every business he touched can be portrayed by a Felini-esque bull in a China Shop scene. You know, lots of odd camera angles and shattering glass. There can be a beach scene for the part where he and Rove met, kissing tenderly, and a slow zoom to a tear in his eye for the tard prisoners he put to death in Tejas. You know, it would show the only time he's ever really truly been happy. He could be holding a puppy, or maybe gassing puppies at the pound. Something like that. I'm not sure how they would show Iraq. Maybe he could be dressed like Scarface, but instead of a pile of Coke in the final scene, he could dunk his head in a barrel of oil and slaughter a mess of American servicemen with his "lil fren". For the fucking of America part, I think maybe something like a dream sequence where a Chihuahua-type dog is hunching a George Washington hand puppet (that Fokkers thing is a pack of plagiarism). It can end with him wearng a cowboy hat and eating clam chowder, riding into the sunset on a Saudi camel.

Riverbend wrote about this today.

The Americans are saying Muhsin was “detained and interviewed�, which makes one think his car was gently pulled over and he was asked a few questions. What actually happened was that his house was raided early morning, doors broken down, windows shattered and he and his three sons had bags placed over their heads and were dragged away. They showed the house, and his wife, today on Arabiya and the house was a disaster. The cabinets were broken, tables overturned, books and papers scattered, etc. An outraged Muhsin was on tv a few minutes ago talking about how the troops pushed him to the floor and how he had an American boot on his neck for twenty minutes.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani had called for the immediate release of the leader of Iraq's main Sunni party, Islamic Party, a statement from his office said.

"President Talabani expressed his surprise and unhappiness at the arrest of the leader of the Islamic Party and called for his immediate release," it said.

"The Presidential Council has not been consulted ... and feels that treating a political personality of this level in such an arbitrary way is unacceptable."

Mistreated?

Abd al-Hamid was arrested at 4am at his home in the al-Khadra district, in western Baghdad, along with his sons Yassir, Muqtad and Assyad, an Islamic Party official Alaa Makki said.

Abd al-Hamid's wife, Muhsin Abd al-Hamid Awatif Ibrahim, told Aljazeera that the US forces ransacked the house.

Talabani said in a statement that the rest was
unacceptable. "They stormed the house, arrested Dr Muhsin and three of our sons, Miqdad, a first Secretary at the Foreign Ministry, and Yasir, Deputy Head of the Sunni Waqf [endowments]. They took their mobile phones and some money from the house," she said.

"They have scattered all the contents of my house, and took our money, jewellery and our ID cards and passports," she added.

"They even wanted to arrest me too, but I told them I had leukaemia so they left me," she said.

No reason was given for the arrest, and the US military in Baghdad was not immediately able to confirm the incident.

Low point

Makki slammed the arrest as "a low point in the history of Americans in Iraq".

He said more than 200 members of the party were currently being held without charge in US detention centres in the country.

All the more surprising, Makki added, was that the action came a day after Iraqi government spokesman Laith Kubba had welcomed a statement by the Sunni party against violence threatening the country's fledgling democracy and social fabric.

The statement had also warned the government against transforming security forces into an instrument of repression under the control of Shia Muslims who now dominate the political scene.

I wonder how long Mr. Abdul-Hamid will remain "moderate." And the beat goes on.

Nothing shocking about his treatment. This is how most Iraqi's are treated by U.S. troops during house raids.

I smell a set-up, though. This guy was trying to work with the new Iraqi government, and is probably considered a traitor by the insurgency.

They could have used an infiltrator in the police or commando units to set him up, and make the moderates look like American bitches.

It can end with him wearng a cowboy hat and eating clam chowder, riding into the sunset on a Saudi camel.

A stunt double will be needed since the real g-dubya would shit his pants trying to ride a camel.

Good post Steve... can the military really be this stupid??...tough call...I'm not much of a conspiracy theorist, but this ranks up there with the dumbest if it was planned to keep up the instability...combine this with the supposed 40,000 man "Operation Limping", featuring the not so tough Badr Brigade (Saddam's guys will mop the floor with this bunch) and you have a perfect platform from which to launch a civil war......if you wanted one!!

Steve,

A couple of points here:

"What kind of fu*k-ups do we have running the American forces in Iraq?"

American fuckups. Now quit putting a fucking asterisk in your swear words. It's candyass. Either swear or don't swear, but don't fucking pretend you're not actually swearing.

"This is incredibly stupid, and either the work of a military that doesn’t want things to settle down in Iraq, or a military that is inept. I’m not sure which is worse."

Okay, I'm going to explain this to you since you obviously missed out on Vietnam. The military is a tool, and this military, our collective military, is right now being raped and perverted by a small group of hostile Republicans. You can say what you want about the need for a military, the tendencies of those in the military, or even the inherent unfairness of military doctrine, but don't go blaming the clusterfuck that is Iraq on our military. Those poor bastards have been sold out by Bush and Rumsfeld and Rice the same way the military was sold out in Vietnam by Johnson and McNamara and Nixon and Kissinger.

Right now, today, no Americans are being fucked over WORSE than the Americans who chose to serve their country by donning a uniform. That includes the generals and the troops. Some of them are miserable human beings, some of them aren't, but none of them made the call on this war, and yet they've all been left holding the bag. The same bag you just blamed them for holding.

Finally, if you think the military made the call to arrest that guy, then you haven't been reading all the conspiracy-theory posts on this blog from your rabid fans. I still hold out hope that you'll think outside the conventional angry-left box from time to time, but at the very least, please don't gravitate to conventional wisdom just because it's expedient. You're better than that.

I stop to look at CNN because they are as bad as Fox. If I want quick news I go to HNN, but mostly go to FSTV.
I do not trust any majors talking media. I do search European news because you have more news than this corporate news media.
Lynn Cheney and hubby were on Larry King tonight. I heard she has the idea that Laura should running for president in 2008, to make sure the neocons stays in power! (Sorry, was not ready to listen to that Adam’s family from hell).
Does that make you feel better! They are really full of themselves.
There are three choices in life. “To run, to spectate or to commit “I was mesmerized by that world. They are as true as we see this evil but feel helpless to change what is happening to this country. When we walk against the evil, no one sees it?
The biggest problem that we are all facing now is that king george got us in a illegal war, and we do not have any says on anything, unless you explain, like I do, to the world that this administration stolen 2 elections. Florida was also found to have fraud last week. I saw it on Democracy Now. It seems that the votes for bush were triple on the voting result, naturally on the computer, And no one check the voting results versus the numbers of eligible voters. That is why the “a*****e” wanted to bed early! He knew the computers were rigged. It is easy to understand when you have a more than C+ you would no the difference! Even if Government was demanded to commit crimes, he was the president and should have say NO. It is easy to win the invasion if you are the only power left. But how you win the population when you don’t put them to work but instead gibe the work to Cheney? Sorry Halliburton has an 80% increase in revenue?
Next month, it will be held in Turkey. A lot of people who have commit genocide have eventually been found guilty. For a sane world, bush and co should be found guilty as charge.

"This is what happens to those who boycotted the elections."
--Yelled by an American translator to the family of Sunni leader Mohsen Abdul-Hamid as American forces dragged him and his sons away today

What a great idea! Now if only we could do this to the American citizens who don't vote in our own elections, maybe it would increase the turnout a bit in 2008

I agree with Phaedrus.

The soldiers in the field are, by and large, young, not brilliant, but trying their best to stay alive and generally doing nothing much more than following (sometimes illegal, but that's REAL hard to know) orders from their superiors.

The leaders in the field are well-educated and well-trained and know exactly what they are doing and are taking direct orders from Washington that they probably KNOW are illegal, but they would like to outlast this administration and keep their pensions and they know that if they make ONE false move, they will be cut off instantly.

And, of course, the leaders in Washington are a bunch of nutcase chickenhawks with the political finese of a TOW missle and the class of a soccer hooligan.

I think the only thing that will scare the MSM into actually COVERING these crimes is the possibility that we will all simply stop buying their product (KILL YOUR TELEVISION -- anything worth watching will be on DVD within 12 months anyway). After all, they are, at their most basic, simply BUSINESSES, and they are not being paid enough by the neo-cons to give up all their profits to be the Republicans propoganda machine full-time. As long as they can do it and STILL collect their revenues, they will happily protect their mutual interests, but as soon as ratings start falling dramatically, they will have to consider whether the "story of the century" (i.e. the massive corruption, two stolen elections, and the multiple impeachments) would be worth covering.

And where the fuck is George Soros during all this? Can't he REMEMBER 1938? Isn't he starting to panic just a little?

Pesonally, I'm starting to think we're on the 53rd monkey of 100 and moving quick. Either that, or we're frogs being slow-boiled.

Charlie L
Portland, Oregon
CLL2001@Gmail.com

The U.S. Forces got "gamed" again. It sounds like some Iraqi with a grudge against Mr. Abdul-Hamid gave the U.S. forces a bogus tip. The reason I say this is because of the comment made by the American (Iraqi?) translator: "This is what happens to those who boycotted the elections." Was this said in English or in Iraqi? The translators assigned to U.S. military units, from what I've read, are Iraqis hired for that purpose. In other words, did our soldiers even know what the Iraqi translator said in an accusatory manner? Do our troops realize they've been "suckered" by some Iraqi out to settle a score? If an investigation of this incident occurs, which I believe is warranted, it is imperative that U.S. commanders find out who the "tipster" is who fed them bogus intel so they can take the necessary action. And especially, never trust that person again. Oh wait, it was probably Ahmad Chalabi...that trickster. I would be curious to find out who the tipster/trickster is who put U.S. soldiers in harm's way based on bogus intel...besides Bush, that is. And Rumsfeld. And Cheney. And Rice. And Perle. And Wolfowitz. And Powell. (wheeww, there's not enough space to list all the tricksters who put our soldiers in harm's way based on bogus intel).

First, Replying to the previous post asking if our soldiers knew what the translators were saying to this Sunni moderate...

I would imagine that this guy already knows English himself. Maybe I'm wrong. Check it out.

I think everyone is missing the point of the arrest and it certainly was not a mistake, but another attempt to intimidate. The same thing happened to Newsweek - they threw a hood over the face of the reporter. In Iraq, where the military goes virtually unchecked they can throw the guy in prison, terrorize his family and call it an error. In this country they can only silence a voice with threats. I'm sure they would so the same here if they could figure out how.