Iraqis react to handover

Powerful pictures and interesting views on BBC News Online

Boohoo, Galloway let off again

Charles Johnson was spotted crying into his Coco Pops this morning after reading newspaper reports that evil terrorist mastermind and Lizard-enemy #1, George Galloway, has been exonerated from another heinous crime, this time embezzling charity money. Read on

LGF: Shortsighted media analysis

Notorious war-blogger Charles Johnson took a pot shot at Britain's Daily Mirror newspaper on Thursday (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11493_Mirror_Fakes_Photos_Suffers_Consequences). With unconcealed glee he reported that the newspaper, which for long took an anti-War stance over Iraq, lost 40,000 readers in May. No doubt Charles believes this is the fault of its stance on the war.

Unfortunately (for Charles), the loss in circulation is largely down to a sudden drop in bulk sales and freebies (which all papers use to boost their figures) following the takeover of Bhs stores by investor Phillip Green.

Another example, then, of why not to trust those geeks hammering out their political, economic and social analyses from a continent away.

The sword swings both ways

Order and civility have obviously been restored in Afghanistan: Afghan troops behead Taliban men

An Afghan Abu Ghraib?

The Guardian reports that prisoners held by US troops in Afghanistan are subject to routine torture and humiliation similar to that in Abu Ghraib (now 'Camp Redemption').

LGF: Kill Those with Cameras

Charles Johnson expresses his outrage once again that anyone should dare to document the war in Afghanistan and Iraq on camera other than from his perspective. CJ's greatest hatred is reserved for Al Jazeera TV, whom he calls "the most powerful ally of terror in the world" (what: greater than the CIA? greater than the international arms and drugs trade? greater than the oil-grabbing neocon regime currently in the whitehouse? http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11459_Killers_with_Cameras). But he also has it in for The Australian (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11458_Naked_Appeasement_at_the_Australian), MSNBC (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11456_MSNBC-_Failure_Central), the BBC (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11441_BBC-_Living_in_a_Bubble) - basically the entire media (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11450_The_Media_Are_the_Enemy).

LGF is pure and true and good and has the blessings of the Almighty, while all journalists are scum and should be sent to re-education camp (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11455_Reaching_Out_to_the_Under-Educated).

Poll

Charles Johnson: Islamic expert

The scaly green webmaster of Littlegreenfootballs.com, Charles Johnson (who is not a woman, as far as we can tell), is now an expert on Islamic teaching! Indeed, CJ points out in the latest missive to his minions that many imams in France are 'self-taught' and don't have 'the right credentials' (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11437_Self-Taught_Spiritual_Leaders). Well blow me down: religious preachers making things up? Whatever next? The Pope's a Roman Catholic? Bears do it in the forest?

Charles Johnson: It was the Jews!

The Ueberlizard must have had his tinfoil hat on this morning when he posted an item about an AFP photograph of Dick Cheney in which he insinuated that the French News Agency was guilty of subtle anti-semitic propaganda when it ran a picture of the American vice president with (shock-horror!!) an ISRAELI flag behind him (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11426_AFP_Photo_Editorial#comments).

Now if this isn't a prime example of French perfidity, then Charles is REALLY going conspiracy-gaga.

Remembering Reagan

The 9/11 report

"The US commission investigating the September 11 attacks reported yesterday it had found no evidence that Iraq and al-Qaida cooperated in the plot," reports the Guardian.

Further, according to Der Spiegel, Osama Bin Laden may not have been the mastermind behind the attack at all, though he did supply funds for and know of the operation.

And on BBC Radio 4 Howard Dean talks about how America was deceived (realplayer required).

Charles Johnson: Orientalist

Chief LGF lizard Charlie J has a tendency to describe Muslim terrorists as 'savages' (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11397_Islamic_Savages_Parade_US_Hostage). This might be understandable, considering the actions perpetrated by the people he is talking about (decapitations, video-kidnappings etc). Except, of course, where similar things are done by Americans (bombing wedding parties, torturing prisoners, sniping unarmed civilians), the word 'savage' would be replaced by 'brave servicemen and -women'. To CJ, only 'towel heads' can be savages. Orientalism anyone?

MEMRI

An old but important article about the Middle East Media Research Institute

Janis Karpinksi interview on the BBC

Brigadier General Janice Karpinski tells the BBC's John Humphrys she is being made a scapegoat for what happened in Abu Ghraib

A great American

Conspiracy Theory - LGF style

Charles Johnson has figured out what the world's best intelligence agencies haven't been able to figure out: what happened to those 'weapons of mass destruction' that Saddam Hussein had stockpiled but which mysteriously failed to materialise before, during or after the war. In a posting titled 'WMD Puzzle Begins to Come Together' (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11361_WMD_Puzzle_Begins_to_Come_Together), CJ asserts that what ol' Saddam did was dismantle his WMD, crush them into scrap metal, and then secretly ship them out of the country so that nobody would guess he'd ever had them. Cunning plan, eh? There are only a few minor flaws with this theory:

1) If Saddam had WMD, why didn't Saddam hold onto them instead and use them against the invaders?

2) If Saddam really was prepared to scrap his alleged WMD in order to stay in power, why didn't he just hand them over to the UN to do so? It might have led to a loss of face, but less so than being invaded and having to hide in a hole in the ground for weeks...

3)...or better yet, destroy them all himself, and have inspectors come and verify this?

The most likely explanation for the appearance of large amounts of Iraqi scrap metal all over the world is that some enterprising scrap dealers decided to make a bit of money out of selling off disused industrial metal - and possibly even machinery that had once been used to produce weapons. But this is a very long way away from proving Saddam had an arsenal of ready-to-use WMDs in the run-up to the war.

LGF idiocy: priceless

You know littlegreenfootballs.com, that weblog where they go on about how America is doing great things by bringing democracy to the Mulsim world? Seems like that sentiment doesn't extend to Muslims per se, just the ones America is invading right now...

In a thread entitled 'Respect Islam, Do Not Vote', Charles "No Torture" Johnson picks up on a comment by the lunatics at Al Muhajiroon which urges Muslims in Britain NOT to vote in the coming European and Local Elections (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11310_Respect_Islam_Do_Not_Vote). Charlie wholeheartedly supports the sentiments of this fringe group of Muslims, because he too feels that Muslims should not vote. What would the world come to, after all, if Muslims got elected representatives just like everybody else!?

His mini-Lizards take the bait, proceeding to suggest what Muslims should do instead ("BRING A PIG INTO YOUR LOCAL MOSQUE, KILL IT, EAT IT, DOWN IT WITH SOME BOOZE, ALL THE WHILE HAVING SEX WITH YOUR GIRLFRIEND AND SINGING HATIKVAH"), what they can do next ("Now if they just packed up the camels and went home...") etc etc.

Thankfully, there is the odd voice of reason, even on LGF (eg: http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11310#c0051). Shame it tends to get banned...

Israel cracks down on anti-Arab racism

What took them so long?

IDF kills Arafat - in wheelchair

Is the Israeli Army getting a bit confused? It's certainly getting too trigger happy, when a 'warning shot' kills a protester.

Kandahar Cockney

In 1997 James Fergusson, a British correspondent on assignment in rebel-controlled Afghanistan, is helped by a resourceful 19-year-old interpreter called Mir. But because of his association with the Western media, the young Afghan is forced to flee to London - where the guided becomes the guide. Listen to the programme

Old man dies, Charles Johnson seethes

As the news came in over the weekend that the B-movie actor turned US president, Ronald 'McDonald' Reagan, had died at the ripe old age of 93, the world yawned and threw another burger on the bbq.

Charlie J of LGF fame however threw a hissy-fit at the fact that the Reuters news agency ("who else?") had DARED to present an other-than-rosy picture of the grand old cowboy (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=11289_Al-Reuters_Slimes_President_Reagan).

Is Bush an Iranian agent?

Matthew Yglesias makes a compelling argument for why Bush must be in the pay of the mad mullahs

Lucianne.com blasted by Marines

Media Matters reports that LGF's satanic sister, Lucianne.com, has provoked the wrath of the US Marine Corps over the racist content posted by some of its users. This content, incidentally, is quite similar to that found on Little Green Footballs.

Are you a Disaffected, US-Hating Terrorist?

More on the Brandon Mayfield case