'We Got 'im'

[KevinTheOmnivore]

Originally Posted by The One and Only...

Because several smaller parties hold opinions closer to various individuals than the two dominant ones.

Take, for example, the Republican Party. How many ideologically moderate libertarians and conservatives voted for Bush despite better suited alternatives (i.e. Reform Party, Libertarian Party)?

Right, but it all depends on how you perceive electoral politics and its purpose. If a "popular front" will get your ideas into the public sphere, even a tiny bit, isn't that worth it? Ideological conservatives spent a lot of time in the 20th Century frustrated, being relegated to ideological think tanks and small organizations of intellectuals. The Goldwater and even the Wallace 3rd party campaigns were seen as popular fronts, a mixture of frustrated conservatives and and southern moralistic populist types. It was Reagan who first used this front, with the Republican Party as its conduit, and made it work. So I guess the question you have to ask is, did it work? Did the Reagan administration push the economic values you cherish enough...?

Now, the reason I mention the Democratic Party is due to the fact that it does not have a very well established base as far as political theory. The Republican Party does: it has favored neoconservativism in recent years. The DP has a greater variety - environmentalists and supporters of big labor are both left-wing, but sometimes come into conflict.

This hasn't always been the case, and I tend to agree with Schlesinger, who viewed politics as cyclical. The Republicans were once divided ideological, between liberals and conservatives. Both parties polarized after the New Deal, but that increased competition, and clarified the stances the parties would take.

I think your comment about the Dems. as an interest group based party-- it's slightly true, but not entirely. That is more a result of the 60s and New Left 70s, when the lower-class/blue collar types that traditionally voted Democrat sort of turned away for good. I'm Irish Catholic, and my family has a long Democratic tradition, but they haven't actually voted Democratic in years. They are, for all intensive purposes, "National Liberals," of the FDR/Truman/LBJ ilk.

I think you're right, if both parties are "big tent" parties as it's popularly put, then the Republicans are more cohesive than the Democrats. But, IMO, the Right has ALWAYS been better at that. It was Pat Robertson's and Newt Gingrich's "no enemies to the Right" policy in the early 90's that led to the Congressional take over. The Dems. are a big tent with a lot of pissed off clowns and lion tamers (to keep with the circus analogy), all pulling back and forth for power. I personally prefer that party model, and find two large, stagnant, overly-bureacratic parties to be dull and even dangerous for civic health. The Left is too divisive, too full of intellectuals and know-it-alls who all have the solutions to everything. That makes a popular front difficult.

I think that a few dominant, broad parties would arise out of the chaos that followed so as to ensure enough support to be strong. On the other hand, I think that a few of them would be very different from the ones that we have now.

I wouldn't mind seeing it, I just don't know that we ever will. Keep your eye on the Illinois state legislature. Years ago, they had something that essentially resembled a parliamentary/proportional voting system. Multiple parties had power, and that was the problem. Communists began getting seats on the legislature, so the then Republican governor did away with the system somehow. Now, Republicans are kicking themselves, because they are the political minority in Illinois, and there's actually a big push to get that system back. If it happens, it could be a "trend starter" for multi-paty representation. Who knows.....

Whoo! Haven't posted that much in a long time....

[FS]

I'm glad for the people that lived in fear of him that he's now caught. I'm sure it will alleviate the situation in Iraq to some degree, but how strongly will probably depend on the mindset of Saddam's remaining supporters and what's going to happen to Saddam.

Question: live or die? There's so many factors to take into account from here on. As for myself, on one hand I'm still opposed to the death penalty, but when confronted with news footage of everything he's done, I don't know if even I think this man should live.

[Ant10708]

Doesn't really matter. He's going to live.

[Drew Katsikas]

I can't wait for Ranxer to post an elabortae "legit" conspiracy theory that's been developed within the past 24 hours.

[soundtest]

Finally! They caught that bastard behind the 9/11 attacks! Oops, my mistake... he was the one with the weapons of mass destruction... waitaminute...

[Protoclown]

I still say a LOT can happen in a year, and the 2004 election is far from determined yet.

[mburbank]

I agree with Proto. A year is absolutely forever in electoral terms. It's one of the main reasons I believe this really is Sadaam. I think if he'd never gotten caught, Democrats would have had political capital they don't have now. But the political capital of having captured him will be long gone, old news. Plus, they need to keep him shut up for over a year now. Suppose he has all kinds of proof that he'd never have attained power or held it without the help of the CIA? A lot of people may have forgotten how cozy we were with the Baathists pre gulf war one. Saadam may be ikely to remind them. If we keep him in an undoclosed location for over a year, that's going to raise questions on it's own.

Other Points: I'm glad they caught him.

I cannot believe the administration, having caught him, already has to lie about it. Bremmer said this morning they caught him yesterday, and that they already have DNA evidence that it's really him. That is simply not possible. Like lying about the Britts radio message when Bush flew in for thanksgiving, it is totally uneccesary. They are an administration of t6otally compulsive liars.

While I personally think that Bush will squeak out another term, I think it's very, very niave for any of you to think that the election is not in question. I think he's very vulnerable. I think he's been a highly active conservative WAY WAY too the right of where the the electorate actually is. I think the rosy news about the economy is like me having no job and putting a new car on my kids credit card. I think a lot of people out of work aren't going to believe the economy is doing well until they're working again, and that may not happen in the next year. I think this is a spooky as hell adminsitration that's done a lot of VERY ugly shit and a lot of shoes can drop in a year.

I'd aalso remind you all that while Nixon won a second term in a landslide it didn't last very long.

[AChimp]

I wonder if the U.S. will turn Saddam over to the UN, or if it's going to be some gay, Iraqi joke trial instead.

[Ant10708]

Some faulty news reporter said they had DNA evidence already. The administration clearly said that they were working on having DNA evidence provided.

I'm pretty sure Saddam is going to be tried by the Iraqis.

[The One and Only...]

Originally Posted by KevinTheHerbivore

Right, but it all depends on how you perceive electoral politics and its purpose. If a "popular front" will get your ideas into the public sphere, even a tiny bit, isn't that worth it? Ideological conservatives spent a lot of time in the 20th Century frustrated, being relegated to ideological think tanks and small organizations of intellectuals. The Goldwater and even the Wallace 3rd party campaigns were seen as popular fronts, a mixture of frustrated conservatives and and southern moralistic populist types. It was Reagan who first used this front, with the Republican Party as its conduit, and made it work. So I guess the question you have to ask is, did it work? Did the Reagan administration push the economic values you cherish enough...?

The problem here is that while Reagan was probably as free market as he could be if he ever wanted to gain support, he also had the more moralistic aspects of the Right in his presidency. In addtion, his policy on the Soviet Union was very different from what I would have supported, and he spent too much via the budget deficit for my liking.

This hasn't always been the case, and I tend to agree with Schlesinger, who viewed politics as cyclical. The Republicans were once divided ideological, between liberals and conservatives. Both parties polarized after the New Deal, but that increased competition, and clarified the stances the parties would take.

I think your comment about the Dems. as an interest group based party-- it's slightly true, but not entirely. That is more a result of the 60s and New Left 70s, when the lower-class/blue collar types that traditionally voted Democrat sort of turned away for good. I'm Irish Catholic, and my family has a long Democratic tradition, but they haven't actually voted Democratic in years. They are, for all intensive purposes, "National Liberals," of the FDR/Truman/LBJ ilk.

I think you're right, if both parties are "big tent" parties as it's popularly put, then the Republicans are more cohesive than the Democrats. But, IMO, the Right has ALWAYS been better at that. It was Pat Robertson's and Newt Gingrich's "no enemies to the Right" policy in the early 90's that led to the Congressional take over. The Dems. are a big tent with a lot of pissed off clowns and lion tamers (to keep with the circus analogy), all pulling back and forth for power. I personally prefer that party model, and find two large, stagnant, overly-bureacratic parties to be dull and even dangerous for civic health. The Left is too divisive, too full of intellectuals and know-it-alls who all have the solutions to everything. That makes a popular front difficult.

Yes, it does, but in more recent years we have seen a comeback by the Dems. largely due to the rise of large, multinational corporations - something that many feel threatened by in the Information Age. The Dems. diversity has also helped them, since it has granted them the opportunity to cherry-pick popular issues for, for lack of a better term, the greater good.

I'm fully aware that the Dems. used to be the party for the South, but during modern times, that has been the Reps. territory. At least until Viva el Dean :/.

I wouldn't mind seeing it, I just don't know that we ever will. Keep your eye on the Illinois state legislature. Years ago, they had something that essentially resembled a parliamentary/proportional voting system. Multiple parties had power, and that was the problem. Communists began getting seats on the legislature, so the then Republican governor did away with the system somehow. Now, Republicans are kicking themselves, because they are the political minority in Illinois, and there's actually a big push to get that system back. If it happens, it could be a "trend starter" for multi-paty representation. Who knows.....

There are three main things I see preventing it:

1) The way our system is set-up favors a two party system. Example: the electorial college. One fear I have is that if the two party system were ever threatened, massive changes to the campaign finance would ensue, resulting in the death of small parties before they had a chance to really have an impact.

2) The need to increase awareness. I'm banking that most people don't even know where they truly lie on the political spectrum. Not only that, how many know about third parties outside of the Green and Reform Party, anyway?

3) The need to convince the public that their vote will count. A good way would be to give outrageous examples to defy that type of logic - say something like "if there were two candidates, but you knew that the one you wanted was going to lose, would you vote for the other one?"

Anyway, we have gotten way off my original statement, which said that if people voted intelligently, they would vote for third parties. Granted, I don't know how much of that is really true, but I'll bet we would see a substantial increase in votes going towards them.

[CastroMotorOil]

The iraqis will roast this guy alive...

personally i beleive that the situation will alleivate to a degree. From what i understand this was not his only hole in the ground. SOMEONE was moving him around, probably party supporters and people with access to the resistance groups, who then spread his message. He still had some control over his supporters, but now without him, i think their cohesiveness will deteriorate. Plus, how many civiallians were still in fear of him returning, and thus either supporting him or at least not helping the US.

In the WMD argument, i wonder if he will actually tell us if any are still stashed in Iraq, or if any were moved to Syria (unlikely but it still could have been done).

[KevinTheOmnivore]

Originally Posted by mburbank

I cannot believe the administration, having caught him, already has to lie about it. Bremmer said this morning they caught him yesterday, and that they already have DNA evidence that it's really him. That is simply not possible. Like lying about the Britts radio message when Bush flew in for thanksgiving, it is totally uneccesary. They are an administration of t6otally compulsive liars.

http://www.smh.com.au/cgi-bin/common...941612613.html

We got him: Kurds say they caught Saddam
By Paul McGeough, Herald Correspondent in Baghdad

December 22, 2003

Washington's claims that brilliant US intelligence work led to the capture of Saddam Hussein are being challenged by reports sourced in Iraq's Kurdish media claiming that its militia set the circumstances in which the US merely had to go to a farm identified by the Kurds to bag the fugitive former president.

The first media account of the December 13 arrest was aired by a Tehran-based news agency.

American forces took Saddam into custody around 8.30pm local time, but sat on the news until 3pm the next day.

However, in the early hours of Sunday, a Kurdish language wire service reported explicitly: "Saddam Hussein was captured by the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan. A special intelligence unit led by Qusrat Rasul Ali, a high-ranking member of the PUK, found Saddam Hussein in the city of Tikrit, his birthplace.

"Qusrat's team was accompanied by a group of US soldiers. Further details of the capture will emerge during the day; but the global Kurdish party is about to begin!"

The head of the PUK, Jalal Talabani, was in the Iranian capital en route to Europe.

The Western media in Baghdad were electrified by the Iranian agency's revelation, but as reports of the arrest built, they relied almost exclusively on accounts from US military and intelligence organisations, starting with the words of the US-appointed administrator of Iraq, Paul Bremer: "Ladies and gentlemen: we got 'im".

US officials said that they had extracted the vital piece of information on Saddam's whereabouts from one of the 20 suspects around 5.30pm on December 13 and had immediately assembled a 600-strong force to surround the farm on which he was captured at al-Dwar, south of Tikrit.

Little attention was paid to a line in Pentagon briefings that some of the Kurdish militia might have been in on what was described as a "joint operation"; or to a statement by Ahmed Chalabi, head of the Iraq National Congress, which said that Qusrat and his PUK forces had provided vital information and more.

A Scottish newspaper, the Sunday Herald, quoted from an interview aired on the PUK's al-Hurriyah radio station last Wednesday, in which Adil Murad, a member of the PUK's political bureau,

said that the day before Saddam's capture he was tipped off by a PUK general - Thamir al-Sultan - that Saddam would be arrested within the next 72 hours.

An unnamed Western intelligence source in the Middle East was quoted in the British Sunday Express yesterday: "Saddam was not captured as a result of any American or British intelligence. We knew that someone would eventually take their revenge, it was just a matter of time."

There has been no American response to the Kurdish claims.

An intriguing question is why Kurdish forces were allowed to join what the US desperately needed to present as an American intelligence success - unless the Kurds had something vital to contribute to the operation so far south of their usual area of activity.

A report from the PUK's northern stronghold, Suliymaniah, early last week claimed a vital intelligence breakthrough after a telephone conversation between Qusrat and Saddam's second wife, Samirah.
----

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor...tain&printer=1

Saddam was held by Kurdish forces, drugged and left for US troops

LONDON, (AFP) - Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) was captured by US troops only after he had been taken prisoner by Kurdish forces, drugged and abandoned ready for American soldiers to recover him, a British Sunday newspaper said.


Saddam came into the hands of the Kurdish Patriotic Front after being betrayed to the group by a member of the al-Jabour tribe, whose daughter had been raped by Saddam's son Uday, leading to a blood feud, reported the Sunday Express, which quoted an unnamed senior British military intelligence officer.


The newspaper said the full story of events leading up to the ousted Iraqi president's capture on December 13 near his hometown of Tikrit in northern Iraq (news - web sites), "exposes the version peddled by American spin doctors as incomplete".


A former Iraqi intelligence officer, whom the Express did not name, told the paper that Saddam was held prisoner by a leader of the Kurdish Patriotic Front, which fought alongside US forces during the Iraq war, until he negotiated a deal.


The deal apparently involved the group gaining political advantage in the region.


An unnamed Western intelligence source in the Middle East told the Express: "Saddam was not captured as a result of any American or British intelligence. We knew that someone would eventually take their revenge, it was just a matter of time."

[ziggytrix]

I can't believe Kurds caught him, and turned him over alive.

[Abcdxxxx]

A few websites posted early theories suggesting Saddam was a prisoner in that hole, the day he was found. It seems Iraqi's are prone to hanging out in these holes a lot when they need to hide, and that "rat holes" are common.... only they usually have two entrance/exit points, instead of Saddam's meager one ice box lid into the ground design.

Perhaps the cash, and some bargaining power meant more to the Kurds then his murder... and a back end deal promising an eventual execution under the Iraqi's jurisdiction wouldn't have hurt.

So the real mystery would be where and how the Kurds really found Saddam, and what was the story with the fresh stash of US bills found near his hole?

[Supafly345]

A quarter of a million dollars was found with him to pay off families of suicide bombers.