|
Banned
|
Lebanon is a wartorn, impoverished nation of 4 million, and Bush annoints a young Saudi from a family now worth $16,700 million, to lead them....
This is the "process" Cheney used to build support for Iraq war...and it's ongoing for Iran war....all of the "think tanks" have joined hands:
Quote:
http://www.swordscrossed.org/node/53
The Overton window.
tacitus - Thursday, November 16, 2006 - 20:05
Tags:
As some may know, I work at a free-market think tank, and as such, qualify as a full-fledged member of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy. While places like the Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute and others are justly famous for their national-level work, it's <a href="http://www.spn.org/directory/">the network of state-level think tanks</a> that are, to my biased mind, the unsung heroes of the movement.
So, with that being said, and mindful of my business-related absence for the latter half of this week, I'm going to share with you a little strategizing exercise from the bowels of the VRWC.
The mission of a think tank is to introduce ideas into public discourse and normalize them within the public discourse. The steps an idea takes to full legitimacy are roughly as follows:
# Unthinkable
# Radical
# Acceptable
# Sensible
# Popular
# Policy
This is a rough continuum. Not all ideas start at the same point, not all make it to the endstate -- and some travel backwards. The think tank, with its advocacy and scholarship, does its best to make sure that its preferred ideas reach their endstate. But how does it do this in a systemic way? How does it stay within the bounds of possibility -- the acceptable, sensible, and popular -- even as it reaches for long-term goals in the radical and unthinkable categories?
One useful tool is the Overton window. Named after the former vice president of the <a href="http://www.mackinac.org/">Mackinac Center for Public Policy</a> who developed the model, it's a means of visualizing where to go, and how to assess progress. Let's say, for example, that you want to make education as free and choice-based as it can possibly be. Let's start by developing a continuum of educational states, from the desired extreme of total freedom, to the undesirable extreme of total statism. It might look something like this:
# No government involvement in education.
# All schools private with government regulation.
# Voucher system with public schools.
# Tuition tax credit with public schools.
# Homeschooling legal.
# Private schools restricted.
# Homeschooling illegal.
# Private schools illegal.
# Children taken from parents and raised as janissaries. ....
.......The bolded items, representing the politically possible amongst all conceivable options, are the Overton window. The idea is to shift that window in the preferred direction. In Michigan today, the Overton window looks substantively different:
# No government involvement in education.
# All schools private with government regulation.
<h3># Voucher system with public schools.
# Tuition tax credit with public schools.
# Homeschooling legal.
# Private schools restricted.</h3>
# Homeschooling illegal.
# Private schools illegal.
# Children taken from parents and raised as janissaries.
Step by step, ideas that were once radical or unthinkable -- homeschooling, tuition tax credits, and vouchers -- have moved into normal public discourse. Homeschooling is popular, tuition tax credits are sensible, and vouchers are acceptable. (On the latter, they've been soundly defeated in Michigan of late, but the point is that they are a part of normal public and political discourse.) The de facto illegality of homeschooling, by contrast, has gone the way of the dodo. The conscious decision to shift the Overton window is yielding its results.
So there's your tip from the VRWC for the day. <h3>It's a methodology that could work for the left as easily as the right, although I'm not aware of a single left-wing think tank (and they are few) that operates so systemically.</h3> If you're of an analytic bent, and want to figure out where a legislative or policy strategy is heading, try constructing the scale of possibilities and the Overton window for the subject at hand. Change can happen by accident, true: but it is just as often the product of deliberation and intent, and it does all of us well to understand the mechanisms by which it occurs.
|
<h3>I'm going to hazard a guess as to why Bush and Cheney now visit with Walid Jumblatt and Cheney publicly praises the man....and the expected reaction, a loud cacophony from the conservative noise machine, is nowhere to be heard:
Saad Hariri, heir to his ($16.7) billionnaire, former Lebanese prime minister father's legacy and fortune, decided to depart (prodded by a "remember the Maine"-like, "OP") from his murdered father's support for Syria, since the world is supposed to believe that the Syrian president ordered the 2005, massive car bombing assassination of Rafik Hariri, and Saad Hariri's politcal ally, Walid Jumblatt, joined him in the about face move towards the US/Israel and the French and British, the "noise machine" was ordered to STFU about "the affront to the troops" that took place when Jumblatt was invited inside the white house.
The "little people", in Lebeanon and in the USA, should consider that Rafik Hariri departed Lebanon as a sunni peasant, established Saudi citizenship, and raised his fortune and his children in Saudi Arabia, returning to Lebanon in his mid 40's to enter politics, leaving his family in Saudi Arabia, as his son, Saad is doing now. The 2005 voting indicated that Lebanese were resigned to Saad's leadership, not inspired by it. Bush and Cheney are simply desperate for allies, even a flip flopper like Jumblatt, and the Bush regime and the Israelis gained much more from
Rafik's bombing; suggesting that either their sudden good fortune is no coincidence, or the Syrians are too stupid to deserve any suspicion that they've been "set up". Bush and Cheney gravitate towards Saudi billionaires and royalty like moths to flame, despite the lips ervice they pay to highly prinicipled, "democratization. Control of any country by Saudi billionaires, in alliance with the US, only temporarily dampens the powderkeg that will one day blow up in that region. Bottomline here is the "AQ" threat is a Bush/Cheney authored manipulation to further their actual goals, closely aligned with the Israelis. Saad Hariri either has too much money to care how it all turns out, or he's either stupid enough to beleive that the Syrians were stupid enough to kill his father, or he's acting dumb like a fox. If you read all this, you'll know what to watch for, and it should be an entertaining tragedy. No young Americans would enlist in a military that is ordered to participate in any of this charade, if they actually read about it and contemplated it all, first. Thankfully for Cheney, they probably won't do that. Young Lebanese who risk their lives in support of the Hariri/Cheney "alliance, would be better off supporting Hezbullah, a populist movement in comparison.</h3>
Quote:
http://www.breitbart.com/print.php?i...rticle=1&cat=0
Death Toll in Lebanese Fighting at 47
May 21 04:02 AM US/Eastern
By BASSEM MROUE
Associated Press Writer
TRIPOLI, Lebanon (AP) - Lebanese troops tightened a siege of a Palestinian refugee camp Monday where a shadowy group suspected of ties to al-Qaida was holed up, pounding the camp with artillery a day after the worst eruption of violence since the end of the country's civil war.
Lebanese officials said one of the men killed in Sunday's fighting was a suspect in a failed German train bombing—a new sign that the camp had become a refuge for militants planning attacks outside of Lebanon. In the past, others in the camp have said they were aiming to send trained fighters into Iraq.
Saddam El-Hajdib was the fourth-highest ranking official in the Fatah Islam group, an official said Monday, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. El- Hajdib had been on trial in absentia in Lebanon in connection with the failed German plot and is the brother of another suspect in custody in Germany.
Meanwhile, another attack in a Christian neighborhood of Beirut late Sunday raised fears of growing instability across Lebanon.
The violence between the army and the Fatah Islam group in the northern port city of Tripoli <h3>and the adjacent Nahr el-Bared refugee camp</h3> has killed at least 27 soldiers and 20 militants, security officials said Monday.
The clashes are a significant blow to a country already mired in a dire political crisis between the Western-backed government and Hezbollah-led opposition.
<h3>Little is known about the ideology and backing of the Fatah Islam group. Some officials in Lebanon believe it has ties to al-Qaida, and the group has said it follows an al Qaida ideology.</h3> But other Lebanese officials claim it is simply a Syrian-backed group sent by Damascus to destabilize the country after Syria's forced withdrawal from Lebanon in April 2005.
Hundreds of troops, backed by tanks and armored carriers, surrounded the camp early Monday, as black smoke billowed into the air. The militants responded at daybreak by firing back with mortars.
The clashes between army troops surrounding the camp and Fatah Islam fighters began Sunday after a gunbattle raged in a neighborhood in Tripoli, a predominantly Sunni city known to have Islamic militants, witnesses said.
Meanwhile, in Beirut late Sunday, an explosion across the street from a busy shopping mall killed a 63-year-old woman and injured 12 other people in the Christian sector of the Lebanese capital, police said.
The bomb left a crater about 4 feet deep and 9 feet wide, and police said the explosives were estimated to weigh 22 pounds. The blast—heard across the city—gutted cars, set vehicles ablaze and shattered store and apartment windows.
Beirut and surrounding suburbs have seen a series of explosions in the last two years, many targeting Christian areas. Authorities blamed Fatah Islam for Feb. 13 bombings of commuter buses that killed three people, but the group denied involvement.
Syria has denied involvement in any of the bombings, but Lebanon's national police commander Maj. Gen. Ashraf Rifi said Sunday that Damascus was using the Fatah Islam group as a covert way to wreak havoc in the country, with people assuming it's al-Qaida.
"Perhaps there are some deluded people among them but they are not al- Qaida. This is imitation al-Qaida, a 'Made in Syria' one," he told The Associated Press.
The Lebanese Broadcasting Corp. TV station reported Sunday that among the dead militants were men from Bangladesh, Yemen and other Arab countries, underlining the group's reach outside of Lebanon.
A senior Lebanese security official said a high-ranking member of Fatah Islam, known as Abu Yazan, was among those killed.
Hundreds of Lebanese applauded the army's tough response in the refugee camp in a sign of the long-standing tensions that remain between some Lebanese and the estimated 350,000 Palestinians who have taken refuge in Lebanon since the creation of Israel in 1948.
Prime Minister Fuad Saniora said the fighting was a "dangerous attempt at hitting Lebanese security." Mainstream Sunni Muslim leaders, clerics and politicians threw their support behind the army, as did the Palestine Liberation Organization representative in Lebanon.
It also underlined the difficulty authorities have in trying to defeat the country's armed groups which control pockets across Lebanon.
Fatah Islam is an offshoot of the pro-Syrian Fatah Uprising, which broke from the mainstream Palestinian Fatah movement in the early and has headquarters in Syria, Lebanese officials say.
It is believed to be led by Shaker Youssef al-Absi, a Palestinian who was sentenced to death in absentia in July 2004 by a Jordanian military court for conspiring in a plot that led to the assassination in Jordan of U.S. diplomat Laurence Foley. Al-Qaida in Iraq and its former leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi were blamed for the killing.
___
Associated Press Writer Hussein Dakroub in Beirut contributed to this report.
|
Quote:
http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_s..._take_247.html
<h2>Can we take 24/7 news seriously?</h2>
[<a href="http://turcopolier.typepad.com/about.html">Colonel W. Patrick Lang</a> is a retired senior officer of U.S. Military Intelligence and U.S. Army Special Forces (The Green Berets). He served in the Department of Defense both as a serving officer and then as a member of the Defense Senior Executive Service for many years. He is a highly decorated veteran of several of America’s overseas conflicts including the war in Vietnam. He was trained and educated as a specialist in the Middle East by the U.S. Army and served in that region for many years. He was the first Professor of the Arabic Language at the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York. In the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) he was the “Defense Intelligence Officer for the Middle East, South Asia and Terrorism,” and later the first Director of the Defense Humint Service.”]
<img src="http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/images/2007/05/21/_1287456_artillery_ap300.jpg"> That's an M-48 tank out on a firing range. The Lebanese Army has these. This is an old tank from before the Vietnam period, but, <h3>how new do tanks have to be when used for shelling refugee camps full of civilians? The fighting around the "Nahr al-bared" camp at Tripoli, Lebanon continues.</h3>
Lebanon's political situation remains deadlocked between the US and French supported coalition headed by Siniora and the Iranian supported "opposition" coalition led by Hassan Nasrallah and Hizbullah.
This latter grouping is made up of Hizbullah and Amal Shia, more Sunnis and yet more Christians. The Syrian government tolerates this latter grouping's logistical efforts in and through Damascus from Iran on behalf of Hizbullah.
On the other hand, Prime Minister Siniora's grouping is made up of the allies of Saad Hariri (mostly Sunni Muslims), various hard-line Christian parties (Geagea, etc.) a lot of the Druze and some odds and ends.
The essence of the Lebanese political stalemate has to do with the allocation of political power in Lebanon. Of those elements in the population who have the vote (not Palestinians) the Shia are the most numerous and, in the aftermath of their victory over Israel last Summer, they are demanding a larger, perhaps decisive share in political power in the country. There is also the issue of a UN run tribunal to rule as to who killed Rafik Hariri, but, anyone who thinks about it knows that this is really a "side" issue. If the tribunal decided that Bashar Assad killed Hariri, what would they do, drive to Damascus and arrest him?
The United States and France do not want a larger role for Hizbullah. The United States accepts Israel's definition of Hizbullah as a terrorist group in spite of their toe-to-toe fight against Israel last year and their legitimate status as a political party in Beirut's parliament. France? Evidently, they are looking for love from the United States. It has been lonely for the French lately.
Standing on the sidelines, there are the 350,000 odd permanent Palestinian refugees in Lebanon. They are not Lebanese citizens. They have no political vote, are overwhelmingly Sunni, are excluded from good jobs, and therefore good housing. They are excluded from many Lebanese schools. They and those who came before them have been living in those camps on a kind of "dole" from the UN for a long time, many of them for 50 years. They have no prospects, zero. People who have no prospects are dangerous.
So, they are susceptible to the takfiri jihadi message and influence drifting on the winds of the internets <h3>and in the minds of returned fighters from Iraq. Not surprisingly some of them have accepted the call, the call to drive foreign, kaffir influence out of the Lebanon, the call to vent their rage against a political system that offers them nothing.
The "players" in the Siniora/Hariri coalition do not have clean hands in the matter of the creation and encouragement of Sunni zealotry in Lebanon.</h3> Lebanese political leaders have "played" to the Sunni Lebanese of the north for many years, seeking their support in the maze of Lebanese politics. Did they think that the Sunni Palestinians in the camps would not hear the same message?
So, now we have fighting between the Lebanese Army and Palestinian zealots. What a surprise! If it spreads to camps in the south of Lebanon, the Lebanese Army will be hard pressed. Their commander said so yesterday, urging restraint.
The 24/7 news networks were hard at work today trying to make Syria responsible for the Sunni zealots in the camps. The statement was being made today that these groups were connected to AQ. No evidence was offered, but the assertion was repeatedly made based on the "possibility" that had supposedly been voiced by some nameless person in the Lebanese government. Various Lebanese were asked that question - "Is this Al-Qa'ida?" Nobody could be found who was willing to say that there was an organizational link to Al-Qa'ida, but the question was asked over and over again. This question was paired with another - "Is Syria controlling and "behind" this group?" Nobody could be found who would say that either, but the question was asked over and over again.
<h3>Now, think about it, folks Al-Qa'ida is a virulently anti-Shia Sunni group. Everyone "knows" that Syria supports Hizbullah, a main target of AQ displeasure. So, which is it? Which side does the Syrian government support? Does the Syrian government support both at the same time? </h3> If you believe that, then you really are a sucker for propaganda.
It would be interesting to know who sets the agenda for the content of 24/7 news. Very interesting. pl
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070521/...banon_violence (Dead Link...same "news" story displayed from breitbart.com, above.)
|
Quote:
Published on March 5, 2007 <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/printables/fact/070305fa_fact_hersh">Seymour Hersh wrote:</a>
American, European, and Arab officials I spoke to told me that the Siniora government and its allies had allowed some aid to end up in the hands of emerging Sunni radical groups in northern Lebanon, the Bekaa Valley, and around Palestinian refugee camps in the south.
[...]
Alastair Crooke, who spent nearly thirty years in MI6, [..] Crooke said that one Sunni extremist group, <h3>Fatah al-Islam, had splintered from its pro-Syrian parent group, Fatah al-Intifada, in the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp, in northern Lebanon. Its membership at the time was less than two hundred. “I was told that within twenty-four hours they were being offered weapons and money by people presenting themselves as representatives of the Lebanese government’s interests</h3>—presumably to take on Hezbollah,” Crooke said.
|
Quote:
http://www.counterpunch.org/lamb05302007.html
May 30, 2007
Sharon's Bastille Day Dream Materializes
Lebanon and the Planned US Airbase at Kleiaat
By FRANKLIN LAMB
Bibnin Akkar, Lebanon, site of proposed US Airbase
Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee Camp
.....Despite opposition from Lebanon's anemic environmental movement, that argues that the pristine area should be left to its many varieties of birds and wildlife, the local community is watching closely.
Not much activity is going on as of May 29, 2007. About 20 Quonset huts, some recently driven stakes, no evidence of heavy equipment or building material. The three man army outpost fellows appeared bored and did not even ask for ID as I toured the whole area on the back of a fine new BMW 2200cc motorcycle courtesy of one of the local militia sniper guys who until two days ago was firing into Nahr al-Bared until the Lebanese army stopped him after the PLO leadership complained.
Lebanese entrepreneurs at Bibnin Akkar, a Sunni community loyal to the Hariri's, and who will be the chief financial winners from the project, see opportunities with thousands of new construction and related jobs coming. One kind fellow who hooked me up last night to intermittent internet via a jerry rigged dial up arrangement on one of his shop's two computers envisages running a fine new internet café with at least 50 wireless computers. Hotels, restaurants and businesses of various sorts are planning expansions to meet the demand of the expected workforce.
Who will not benefit from the building boom will be the 40,000+ Palestinians from Nahr al-Bared which is literally next door to the anticipated project These refugees, who were driven from their homes a in Palestine in 1948 and 1967, from Telezatter by the Phalanges in 1975, and others who came as a result of Israeli attacks on Lebanon in 1978, 1982, 1993, 1996, and 2006, will gain no work from Kleiaat. The reason is that the 70 top trades and professions in Lebanon are denied to the Palestinians under Lebanese law.
Even if the 20,000 Palestinians displaced by the current conflict with Fatah al-Islam are allowed to return, which I expect will be the case, and even if Palestinian fears that the Camps will be demolished are unrealized, as I believe, they will remain destitute, according to UNWRA who considers 10,000 of them 'special hardship cases".
As reported by the NATO headquarters in Brussels, as well as by residents in Bibnin Akkar on May 28, 2007, an American-German-Turkish military delegation toured and surveyed Akkar region. US Embassy 'staff' have reportedly visited Kleiaat airport earlier this year to look over the site. David Welch also had a quick look at the site during his recent visit.
A Lebanese journalist who opposes the base commented on May 28, 2007, "The Bush administration has been warning Lebanon about the presence of Al Qaeda teams in northern Lebanon. And the base is needed to deal with this threat. Low and behold, a new "terrorist group" called Fatah al-Islam appears near Kleiaat at al-Bared camp".
The Pentagon argues that the military base will contribute to the development and the economic recovery in the region, advising the Lebanese government to focus on the financial aspect and positive reflection on the population (95% Sunni) of the region.
Contenders for the billion dollar project, according to the Pentagon procurement office could be Bechtel and Halliburton and other Contractors currently doing projects in Iraq.
The martyred Prime Minister Rafic Hariri, saw potential for the Kleiaat airport as well. But he opposed a US airbase. Instead, Hariri, which the green grocer who sells fruits and vegetables to the Lebanese army patrolling the Tripoli-Syria four lane road in front of Nahr al-Bared, commented, " Rafik Hariri, may he rest in peace, loved Lebanon. But he never saw a piece of real estate he didn't want to develop!" Hariri envisaged a billion dollar Free Commercial Zone and a port, despite Syrian opposition, and had investors lined up before he was murdered. Damascus was opposed to the Hariri dream because the new Port and Free Zone would drain the revenues from the nearby Syrian Port at Lathikiya.
According to Washington observers watching developments, the base has been pushed by elements in the office of the US Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the urging of Israeli operative Elliot Abrams. AIPAC can be expected to do the necessary work in Congress and with House Foreign Affairs, Appropriations, Intelligence, and Armed Service committees hermetically sealed by stalwarts of the Israel Lobby, it can be expected that it will be added as a rider to an unsuspecting House bill coming along.
"We need to get this base built as quickly as possible <h3>as a forward thrust point against Al Qaeda and other (read Hezbollah) terrorists", according to AIPAC staffer Rachael Cohen. Asked if Israel will offer training and advisors to the Lebanese army, Ms. Cohen replied, "we will see what we will see, Lebanon, smezzanon its not about them, its about stopping the terrorists stupid!"</h3>
"The question for Lebanon is whether the Lebanese people will allow the base to be built. Few in North Lebanon doubt that Israel will have access to the base " according to Oathman Bader, a community leader who lives in Bahr al-Bared but has fled to Badawi.
Fatah al-Islam and their allies have pledged martyrdom operations to stop the project, according to the Fatah Intifada, the group that expelled Fatah al-Islam from their camp on November 27, 2006.
According to a columnist at Beirut's Al-Akbar newspaper," a US project like that would split Lebanon apart. No way will Lebanon allow it. Probably every group in Lebanon would oppose it , from the Salafi, Islamists fundamentalist to moderate Sunnis to Hezbollah. Can you imagine the Syrian reaction?"
Commenting on this project, one Arab-American from Boston, doing volunteer work at the Palestinian Red Crescent Hospital, Safad, noted:
"Hopefully the US pro Middle East peace, pro-Palestinian, and pro-Lebanon organizations with better phone and internet connections that exist locally, will join the opposition in Lebanon to this base and fight it in Congress. Welch and the US Embassy in Beirut should be questioned about it"
Franklin Lamb's just released book, The Price We Pay: A Quarter Century of Israel's Use of American Weapons in Lebanon is available at Amazon.com.uk. His volume, Hezbollah: a Brief Guide for Beginners is due out in early summer, 2007.
|
<h3>Hariri is sunni, as are his Saudi friends.....</h3>
Quote:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpag...i,%20Ihsan%20A.
Dec 16, 1992
Special to The New York Times
Barely a month after his Cabinet took over, Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri and his plan for rebuilding Lebanon are being attacked by politicians who say he is drawing too close to Saudi Arabia in his effort to raise money.
The criticism, from Muslim and Christian political leaders and newspapers, arises partly from concern that Saudi businessmen may come to dominate Beirut. Mr. Hariri has also been faulted for investing his money in public reconstruction projects while serving as head of the Government.
Mr. Hariri, a 48-year-old billionaire, made his fortune in Saudi Arabia and holds Saudi and Lebanese citizenship.
A group of Saudi businessmen announced on Sunday that they had set up an investment fund for Lebanese reconstruction that eventually would amount to $500 million. For now the Lebanese Government's plans focus on rebuilding the center of the capital, which was demolished in 15 years of factional clashes.
Although Mr. Hariri insists that his business interests are not directly involved, news reports last week said $200 million of his money had been invested in real estate in central Beirut.
"Mr. Hariri must choose between being the Prime Minister of Lebanon or merely the Prime Minister of downtown Beirut," Charles Ayoub, editor of the Christian daily newspaper Ad Diyar, wrote this week.
The Christian daily Nida al Watan warned of what it called a "danger of Lebanon falling under the tutelage of Saudi businessmen."
The naming of Mr. Hariri as Prime Minister has nonetheless stirred optimism among Lebanese after months of economic stagnation and dizzying inflation. The national currency has regained some of its value after a long decline.
|
Quote:
Lebanese Prime Minister Was First City Investor
Thomas, Kate. Houston Post. Houston, Tex. Nov 11, 1992
Abstract
Kate Thomas discusses billionaire Rafik Hariri, Lebanon's newly named and pro-Syrian prime minister who was an early investor in the 1988 recapitalization of First City Bancorp of Texas.
|
[quote]
Quote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programme...nt/4606739.stm
Political ghosts haunt Lebanese poll
By Jim Muir
BBC News, Beirut
Lebanon is holding its first general elections for 30 years, free of the shadow of a Syrian military presence. Jim Muir, who has reported from Lebanon over many years, looks at what has changed in the country - and what has not.
This is an election dominated by the martyrs and ghosts of the past.
In the first round of voting for the 19 Beirut seats, it was the newest martyr, the Sunni Muslim former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, whose image was everywhere, and who swept all before him.
Mr Hariri died instantly on 14 February when his motorcade was caught in a massive explosion which, rightly or wrongly, was instantly and instinctively blamed by most Lebanese on the Syrians.
It triggered the huge demonstrations that brought together hundreds of thousands of people in Beirut with one single demand: Syria, out.
The list put together by Rafik Hariri's son and political heir, Saad, steamrollered the Beirut elections, taking every single seat.
The young Saad, just 35, has no political experience at all. He was running his billionaire father's company in Saudi Arabia when he was suddenly pitchforked into this new life.
Martyrs
<h3>Because the result was a foregone conclusion, the turnout was low - 27% overall, though quite a bit higher among Sunni voters, many of whom felt it a duty</h3> to pay this last act of allegiance to their biggest martyr, whose picture, with or without young Saad, was all over Beirut.
Anyone who is expecting to see a sea of new faces as a result of all this change is going to be disappointed....
But Rafik Hariri is far from being the only martyr whose memory is running in these elections.
|
Quote:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/10/...a/03beirut.php
Oct 3, 2007
Saad Hariri still acts like a guest in his own office.
The executive chair behind the imposing hardwood desk remains occupied by a dead man. On it sits a huge portrait of his father, Rafik Hariri, the former prime minister assassinated on Feb. 14, 2005.
Now Mr. Hariri, at 37 the least experienced of Lebanon's factional leaders, bears the shaky hope for a pro-Western, democratic future in this country, where the region's rivalries are often viciously played out.
''I'm the new kid on the block,'' he says of his two years as leader of the Future Movement, his father's political party and the most powerful Sunni Muslim bloc. ''I just need to get smart very quickly.''
It will not be easy. Not just an uncomfortable visitor in his own headquarters, he is also something of a prisoner in them. When in Beirut, he almost never leaves Qoreitem, the four-story compound his father built around an old mansion. The blinds are drawn to deter sniper fire. Army checkpoints block every road to the compound. Visitors are searched repeatedly as they approach the main gate.
Mr. Hariri will leave town again this week to meet President Bush on Thursday.
He will push for more international support for the mission to identify suspects in his father's killing -- a complicated diplomatic effort inherently tied to isolating Syria, the prime suspect in a string of political assassinations here, including his father's. Mr. Hariri has insisted on holding Syria accountable, even as he has adopted a more conciliatory stance toward pro-Syrian opposition groups like Hezbollah and its allies during tense negotiations over how to pick the next president.
One on one, toward the end of a long day's Ramadan fast, Mr. Hariri, who is often shy and diffident in public, projected surprising warmth and affability in an hourlong conversation, but only when the talk turned away from politics.
He joked about his youth and the rigors of a long-distance marriage. Asked about his Saudi-style goatee, the subject of much teasing among Lebanese, he said he grew it on his wife's orders, when they got engaged. He occasionally wants to shave it off, he said, but added, ''I have to get my wife's authorization.''
His wife and three children still live in Saudi Arabia, where Mr. Hariri grew up, reluctant to join him here because of the constant specter of political violence, which has already killed four of his political allies.
He has huge shoes to fill. Rafik Hariri dominated Lebanon since he brokered an end to the civil war in 1991, took over as prime minister and drove the country forward often by sheer force of personality. He resigned in October 2004.
Saad Hariri does not cut the bullish, charming figure that his father did. Less tribal chief and more chief executive, the younger Mr. Hariri cut his teeth on expanding his family's billion-dollar construction empire into telecommunications while his father was running Lebanon.
He is trying to turn his low-key managerial style into an asset. Mr. Hariri says his goal is to move beyond political paralysis and concentrate on Lebanon's economy. He seeks to set a counterexample to the old warlords and politicians who constantly warn of another civil war.
''They need to be in Hollywood to make these allegations,'' Mr. Hariri said. ''They could make some really good scenes from these stories. We need calmer people in Lebanon.''
Whether calm will make the difference is unclear. Hezbollah, backed by Iran, has kept the government paralyzed for nearly a year trying to gain more power.
Most of Mr. Hariri's politicking takes place in private or on television. The family-owned Future TV network broadcasts all of his stiff and somewhat mechanical speeches, and covers another family tradition, the lavish iftars, evening meals to break the fast at the end of each day of Ramadan.
Hundreds of supporters, from a different area of Lebanon each night, throng into a ballroom the size of a basketball court. Enormous photographs of Rafik Hariri line the walls, and when Saad Hariri addresses the guests, after they have eaten mountains of stewed lamb, he is flanked by mirror images of his father's head, each as large as a man.
On a recent evening, Mr. Hariri exhorted followers to join him in mourning ''your first martyr, Rafik Hariri,'' and promised to lead Lebanon out of its political impasse ''and spare it from the danger of becoming once again the field for regional battles.''
One enthusiastic supporter, Mahmoud Bishara, 41, a cement factory owner from the Bekaa Valley, beamed as he posed for a photograph with Mr. Hariri and wished him ''All God's help.'' On his cellphone, however, he had a screen saver with Rafik Hariri's photograph, and demurred when asked whether the younger Mr. Hariri had the power to lead Lebanon's Sunnis.
''If he's not strong enough, he'll draw strength from us,'' Mr. Bishara said.
A former Hariri family associate, Fadl Chalak, 64, offered a more blistering assessment.
''I have a low opinion of all the leaders in this country, and I mean all of them,'' Mr. Chalak said. ''We are sick and tired of living in a continual crisis, construction and reconstruction, so I say for all of them to go to hell.''
Mr. Chalak spent decades as a point man for Rafik Hariri, leading his reconstruction agency and serving as telecommunications minister in one of his governments. But he retired from politics, and expressed little hope for his country. He credited Saad Hariri with intelligence and ''good intentions,'' but said that ''youth is no excuse'' for his lackluster performance.
Mr. Hariri made no excuses for his inexperience but said he would gain inspiration from his father. ''He's here, he's looking over us, I'm sure,'' he said.
|
<h2>Read the surrounding portion of this transcript; they're supposed to "oversee" Rice and Cheney, and they don't even ask any questions....shiiiiitt !!!!!</h2>
Quote:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...?nav=rss_world
....REP. GARY L. ACKERMAN, D-N.Y.: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Madam Secretary, welcome.
For a moment, I'd like to focus your attention on the presidential succession crisis in Lebanon.
<h3>Support for the Cedar Revolution may be the president's biggest potential win in the Middle East</h3>. And right now that success is just four dead men away from disappearing.
That's the remaining number of parliamentarians that Syria and Iran and their terrorist proxies need to kill in order to destroy the majority and restore Lebanon to its status as a fiefdom.
If losing Gaza was a disaster, try losing Lebanon.
Our response here has been, frankly, inadequate. And I'd like to suggest the following steps to be considered urgently.
First, America's commitment to Lebanon's sovereignty and independence needs to be reiterated by the president in a specific major address.
Damascus and Tehran and the entire Middle East need to hear explicitly that the United States will not accept resumption of foreign domination of Lebanon; that we insist, and mean it, that foreign states refrain from interfering in Lebanon's constitutional process; that we consider the assassination of Lebanese parliamentarians as acts of international aggression; that we will never sacrifice the Special Tribunal for Lebanon to appease other states; and that we will push for the special tribunal to include all assassination's since Rafik Hariri in its purview.
If a presidential statement was important for Burma, it is equally important for Lebanon.
Second, the president should immediately impose economic and political sanctions against the Syrian regime, specifically, President Assad and his family and his coterie of close associates. Their assets in the United States should be frozen, and their travel to this country should be barred. The very same steps should be taken against their proxies in Lebanon.
The president has expansive sanctioning powers under U.S. law that are not even close to being exhausted with regard to Syria.
Third, the United States needs to raise the profile of this crisis much higher. Security Council resolutions are not enough.
ACKERMAN: A formal international contact group should be established with the explicit mission of protecting Lebanon's sovereignty and independence.
Further, I believe the president should appoint a single figure in the United States government to be responsible for managing this crisis.
Fourth and last, the House has twice and the Senate once passed resolutions supporting Lebanon and pledging our continued readiness to put our mouth -- our money where our mouth is.
<h3>Currently, we're getting out-bid in Lebanon by two countries, whose combined GDP is just a third of our national defense budget. If you believe we need more resources to prevent disaster, Madam Secretary you have to ask for them. That support is here.</h3>
Madam Secretary, I know that you and the president have more than enough to handle. Your plate is full. But there's not going to be another chance to save Lebanon. We have to act now.
I summarized these points in a letter that I will give to you, but in the remaining time, I'd like to hear your initial response.
RICE: Thank you very much, Congressman.
First of all, I think that there are a number of ideas that we have been -- you've cited that we've been looking at and others that they will very well be worth doing.
So, thank you for your letter and we'll examine it very closely.
I'm a very firm believer in the point that Lebanon is really one of the key elements in getting a policy that will promote moderation and be able to resist extremism. And we've tried to be very active in Lebanon.
I would say to you that the diplomacy on Lebanon is extremely active right now. I was with my French counterpart just a few weeks ago on this issue, with my British counterpart about it just a couple of days ago.
We are working also on the premise that -- or on the basis that there should be no effort to make Lebanon in any way set aside constitutional processes that would lead to a president of the United States of America would consider illegitimate in some fashion.
Now, the Lebanese are having their discussions. But we know who our allies are in Lebanon and we're in very close contact with them about what is acceptable to them and what is not.
<h2>The president, for instance, met with Saad Hariri just, I think, about 10 days ago. So -- and Walid Jumblatt was just here and met with Mr. Hadley.</h2>
RICE: I was unfortunately out in the Middle East.
But we've been very active with the March 14th group, and we're going to stay active with them.
We are trying to call attention to the fact that the Syrian and Syrian-backed forces are trying to either intimidate or literally destroy the very people who would be able to bring about a democratic solution in Lebanon.
So, we're very focused on this issue, Congressman.
We are trying, as well, to make sure that the tribunal is fully funded, so that it can go ahead and begin its work.
Mr. Brammertz is about to make a report pretty soon. The tribunal needs to be ready to go.
As to resources, we requested and received $770 million in the last supplemental. We believe that that is the appropriate amount for now. It includes budget support; it includes security support.
And I would just note that if you talk to most Lebanese, when they faced this challenge up in the Palestinian camps against that, sort of, Al Qaida-look-alike operation, it was really American help in terms of ammunition and support that arrived with unaccustomed speed to help the military to carry out that task.
Admiral Fallon was just there. Undersecretary of Defense Eric Edelman was just there. And so, we are pressing very hard ahead with our allies in Lebanon.
But I'm very much where you are: We need to do as much as we can because this is a crucial moment for Lebanon. And I welcome very much looking at your ideas.....
|
Quote:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rafik_Hariri
Fortune
By the 1980s, Hariri entered the Forbes top 100. In 2002 Hariri became the fourth-richest politician in the world. Forbes estimated his personal and family's fortune at $4.3 billion on its <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_billionaires">2005 World's richest people.</a> After his assassination, <h2>his family inherited a total of $16.7 billion in 2006, which drew some questions which haven't been explained by the Hariri family on how $4.3 billion became $16.7 billion in the course of the year after the assassination.</h2> All his family members appeared on the Forbes' list of billionaires in 2006.
Rafik Hariri had interests stretching from Riyadh to Paris to Houston. Until returning to Lebanon, his son Saad Hariri ran Saudi Oger, a USD $3.15 billion (sales) construction conglomerate. Oger paid $375 million to increase its ownership in Arab Bank in order to keep out interested Arab-American investors.
In 1990, on the occasion of the graduation of his son, Bahaʻa, from Boston University, Mr. Hariri made the naming gift for what became The Rafik B. Hariri Building, home of Boston University's School of Management.
|
Quote:
http://www.forbes.com/lists/2006/10/Rank_7.html
http://www.forbes.com/lists/2006/10/7625.html
#158 Bahaa Hariri
Age: 39
Fortune: inherited
Source: Inheritance
Net Worth: 4.1
Country Of Citizenship: Switzerland
Residence: Geneva, Switzerland, Europe & Russia
Industry:
Marital Status: married, no children
Boston University, Bachelor of Arts / Science
Eldest son of slain Lebanese prime minister Rafik. Carved out successful career in investment management outside the family fold from Geneva, his home base. More recently, led successful $6.5 billion bid for Turk Telekom, the largest privatization in Turkey to date. Also heavily involved in family's Al-Abdali real estate development project in Jordan that is working to rebuild the city center of Amman. Chairs two soccer clubs in Lebanon. His mother Nazek, brothers Saad, Fahd and Ayman, and sister Hind are all billionaires (see all).
http://www.forbes.com/lists/2006/10/4R2O.html
#158 Saad Hariri
Age: 35
Fortune: inherited
Source: Construction, investments
Net Worth: 4.1
Country Of Citizenship: Saudi Arabia
Residence: Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Middle East & Africa
Industry: Engineering/Construction
Marital Status: married, 2 children
Georgetown University, Bachelor of Arts / Science
Second son of Rafik Hariri, slain prime minister of Lebanon who also founded Saudi Oger, a now $3.3 billion (sales) construction firm. Georgetown University graduate and Saudi business maven has focused on politics since his father's death. The Cuban-cigar-loving leader of Lebanon's Future Bloc won seats in parliament last spring and is considered a likely candidate for prime minister. But the nation's president is blocking him from taking that post. Because of the frictions and safety concerns, spent most of the year away from Beirut in Riyadh. Mother Nazek, his three brothers Bahaa, Fahd and Ayman, and his sister, Hind, are all individual billionaires (see all).
|
Last edited by host; 10-28-2007 at 11:13 PM..
|