Antiwar protest hits Linux world

From Slashdot

The founder and president of Linux Users Los Angeles (LULA) has resigned because of his opposition to the war in Iraq and the U.S. Armed Forces’ use of Linux.”

Clay Claiborne founded LULA eight years ago, which makes him a very early adopter of Linux indeed. He resigned for several reasons, as detailed on his website. Among his reasons, the local Linux email listserv was disallowing talk about the war, and because he wanted to show his new antiwar video last night at an ANSWER LA meeting, the same night as a LULA meeting, and couldn’t find someone to run that meeting. So he quit LULA so he could show the video at the ANSWER meeting.

And a good video it is, though still a rough cut and a bit longish, detailing through news footage, the lies told by our leaders to beat the drums for war, their deceit and arrogance once the war started, and their eventual eating of their own words as things started to go quite wrong. All of this done simply by showing news clips of them speaking.

You can view the video on his website in Real Media, but might want to wait a bit. Getting Slashdotted means about a zillion hits, although he wasn’t linked to directly. We joked last night his web server might melt down, but so far it’s holding up fine!

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Iraq, Saudi bombings aimed at police

Saudi car bomb targets national police

A suicide car bomb blasted the Saudi national police headquarters Wednesday, killing at least nine people and wounding 125 others, just days after the United States warned of a terrorist attack.

68 dead in Basra police car bombing

At least 68 people were killed and many others wounded in suicide car bombing attacks on four police targets both inside and outside the southern Iraqi city of Basrah.

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Tell me again why Democrats are different from Republicans

Bush appoints John Negroponte to be ambassador to Iraq

George Bush has appointed a diplomat infamous for supporting right-wing death squads in Central America during the 1980s to succeed Paul Bremer as the top US official in Iraq. UN Ambassador John Negroponte is set to take over what will be the largest US embassy in the world, that in Baghdad.

And what, you ask, are Democrats doing about this? Opposing the appointment? Becoming outraged that this sends precisely the wrong signal to a country we are at least pretending to want to lead to democracy? No, no, not at all, Democrats are doing none of this. Instead, they think it’s just a peachy keen idea, and are not even putting up token resistance.  

“The Honduras issue is ancient history. The hearings will be an opportunity to look at Iraq,” said a Democratic congressional staffer involved in foreign policy issues. “It’s more important that we have a workable plan [for Iraq] and get the international community more engaged. This should be about a process more than an individual.”

A process that involves a person as tainted as Negroponte will alienate other countries, not get them involved. Not to mention uncounted more alienated Iraqis. What are they thinking?

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Tell it like it is, Ralph

Nader asks for antiwar vote and urges Iraq pullout date

Ralph Nader made an explicit appeal on Monday for votes from the antiwar movement and called for the United States to announce a firm date for the withdrawal of its troops from Iraq.

Mr. Nader, running for president as an independent, said that President Bush was a “messianic militarist” and that Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, the probable Democratic presidential nominee, was “stuck in the Iraq quagmire the way Bush is.”

He suggested that perhaps the withdrawal date should be six months from now. Merely announcing “a date certain,” he said, would “separate the mainstream Iraqis from the insurgents.”

A most sensible idea. Defuse the rebellion by announcing a departure date. Avoid bloodshed. Possibly even leave Iraq with the respect of the world. But Operation Iraqi Liberation has never been sensible, has it?

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The Exodus continues

Spain and Honduras have, of course, already announced they are pulling out of Iraq

Others are following:

Poland planning pull-out of troops from Iraq

Thailand sets conditions for withdrawing Iraq troops

Dominican troops might follow Spain and Honduras in leaving Iraq early

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