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Strategies & Market Trends : Can you beat 50% per month? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Smiling Bob who wrote (7067)	5/1/2004 5:52:41 PM
From: Smiling Bob	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 19256

Americans will soon come to their senses and realize they've been duped- and the lies and crimes this administration engages in can not continue. This will create an economic vacuum. The market will or already has begun to expect this. The 9400 expected in 2003 year end will certainly find its mark in 2004. Bush continues to paint his crime as noble and humanitarian, ignoring his original excuse of Saddam's WMD. The truth is his only "accomplishment" was capturing Saddam. And at what expense? Iraq is in turmoil with no clear direction other than back to where it was. Where's Osama, the person who admitted to 9/11 ??? And why Saddam and not every other America-hating fanatical dictator who commits crimes against their own people? Iraqis Hail Falluja 'Victory' as U.S. Changes Tack 41 minutes ago Add Top Stories - Reuters to My Yahoo! By Fadel Badran FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - Soldiers of the old Iraqi army led by one of Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s generals patrolled Falluja on Saturday, a year after George W. Bush declared "mission accomplished" in ousting the Iraqi regime. Reuters Photo AP Photo Slideshow: Iraq Latest headlines: · Bush Sees Brighter Future in Iraq AP - 13 minutes ago · America's new Iraqi allies in Fallujah are 'not squeaky clean': general AFP - 19 minutes ago · Iraq Veteran Criticizes Bush on Radio AP - 39 minutes ago Special Coverage Cries of "victory over the Americans" echoed from minarets and gunmen celebrated in the streets under the green banner of Islam and Saddam-era Iraqi flags. Thousands who had fled a month of heavy fighting streamed back to their homes after U.S. Marines pulled back from their siege positions. Mired in a confrontation that spilled blood on both sides and outraged Iraqi and Arab opinion, U.S. commanders withdrew to more distant positions on Friday. Security was entrusted to police and a new force of ex-soldiers under General Jasim Mohamed Saleh, formerly of Saddam's feared Republican Guard. U.S. officers said their troops were still ready to storm the city if needed but Marine commander Lieutenant-General James Conway said Saleh's 1st Battalion of the Falluja Brigade would tackle the insurgents and the foreign fighters aiding them. "They have a plan," he said at a base just outside the city. "They understand our view that these people must be killed or captured. They have not flinched and their commander has said as much to his assembly of officers within the last 36 hours." Saleh's offer came just in time, said Conway, who conceded some in his new force may have fought the Marines over the past month. "It got to the point that we thought there were no options that would preclude an attack," he said. But some Iraqis, impatient with an occupation that brought them pictures this week of U.S. and British troops abusing detainees, see a military debacle. "The city's defenders are celebrating," yelled one man as a group of gunmen in civilian clothes raised green banners and rifles aloft on a street to acclaim the "defeat" of the Marines. A uniformed member of Saleh's 1,000-strong force, looked on. On foot and in civilian four-wheel-drive vehicles, Saleh's men patrolled the city, which was once loudly loyal to Saddam. "EYES WIDE OPEN" Americans, deciding whether to re-elect President Bush (news - web sites) in November, may also wonder where the Iraq (news - web sites) venture is taking them after the bloodiest month for U.S. troops since the war began. Bush, in his weekly radio address, said that despite "the serious and continuing challenges," Iraqi life was improving. "Life for the Iraqi people is a world away from the cruelty and corruption of Saddam's regime," he said. A Pentagon (news - web sites) spokesman said the United States was going into the Falluja deal with its "eyes wide open," aware of the risks of dealing with the relatively unknown Saleh, whose influence over -- or indeed links with -- the insurgents are unclear. Marine commanders say they are playing the new arrangement in Falluja by ear and may return to the city. They are still hunting the killers of four American security guards, images of whose mutilated bodies prompted the U.S. offensive a month ago. Hammad Makhlas, returning to Falluja with his wife and five children to find windows smashed and walls damaged at his home, said: "Praise God. The most important thing is that the town's dignity has been preserved with the defeat of the Americans." DEATH TOLL RISING The United States turned to Saleh after failing to root out some 2,000 guerrillas dug in among 300,000 civilians. Bush's critics accuse him of wading into a Vietnam-style "quagmire." The rising death toll is not helping Bush's re-election campaign. In all, 129 Americans were killed in action in April -- nearly a quarter of the combat toll of 541 since U.S. forces invaded in March last year. Two of those died on Saturday. U.S. television program "Nightline" sparked controversy by devoting a show to broadcasting names and pictures of the dead. The bloodshed in Falluja has also not helped Washington win over Iraq's Sunni Muslim minority, long dominant under Saddam. Doctors say 600 died in the siege, enraging many in the "Sunni Triangle" of towns north and west of Baghdad. And U.S. efforts to maintain the goodwill of those Iraqis who did welcome the overthrow of Saddam's Baathist state, such as the Shi'ite majority to the south, have been hampered by the scandal over the abuse of prisoners by military jailers. The Arab world was outraged by photographs published this week showing U.S. troops abusing detainees in Saddam's once notorious Abu Ghraib prison. On Saturday, a London newspaper published images it said showed British troops, who control the Shi'ite south, abusing an Iraqi detainee. Britain's army chief ordered an inquiry. Six soldiers from the British-led forces and an Iraqi policemen were wounded in a gunbattle with Shi'ite fighters loyal to cleric Moqtada al-Sadr at Amara, British officers said. A rocket-propelled grenade was also fired at the troops after they made a number of arrests that a British spokesman said had netted large amounts of weaponry and explosives. story.news.yahoo.com